Boxing is dead

[TMLT87]

It isnt dead, and it isnt dying, but it is past its peak (which is understandable considering its an old sport) and will never again dominate the combat sports landscape like it did before MMA blew up.

[tritium_arma]

Too many belts and promoters and ducking the best.

[Toffee]

been watching since 1999

initial era was:
lennox lewis and klitschos at heavy.
morales, mab, hamed at the lower weights. corrales, mayweather, casamayor ect in the light weights. DLH, tito, mosley, vargas, winky in welter and jr middle.
hopkins against mostly bums
roy jones against mostly bums but looking amazing doing it
jirov and james toney at middle for a bit there.

then you had the second resurgence at welter with floyd, pac, cotto, mosley, margo, williams, ect.


really the main thing though we had a lot of guys fighting each other.

Now days welter, normally the hot division, has worn thin, crawford is like almost mid 30s now and will never fight spence or move up. 154 just **** the bed. 160 is chit with GGG nearing 40 and canelo left.

heavyweight is a mess.

a lot of talent from 130-140 but those guys refuse to fight each other.


Def the worse era in my 22 years as a fan. Hell i only got interested because i caught morales, mab and hamed fighting on hbo randomly and got me hooked.

And in the 90s you had people saying "boxing is dead, they don't fight each other like they did in my day".

The 90s was overrated. We got some good fights but the heavies didn't typically fight each other until they were over the hill.

We all say the same now, yet we might have Wilder/Fury, Fury/Wilder, Joshua/Ruiz, Ruiz/Joshua, Joshua/Usyk... and second string bouts like Dubois/Joyce, Whyte/Povetkin, Povetkin/Whyte, Wilder/Ortiz etc. There have been plenty of decent fights in the last 3 or so years. All these guys appear in top 5s. They're first tier fighters.

In years to come people will probably look back and ask why their generation don't fight like they did in the 2015-2025 era.

[The tucker]

I remember they was saying boxing was dead before Ali blew up

[CornerCutman]

Boxing has a low ceiling but a high floor, for similar reasons. Other sports, at least the major sports, pay athletes salaries and guaranteed contracts and whatnot. Boxing doesn't, so it'll never have the top notch people striving to get there, there won't be college teams anymore, etc. But, because it doesn't do that it's cheaper to put on a boxing match than most other sporting events, so it'll never die either.

I saw two excellent recommendations around here yesterday, minor things that would advance the sport. First, have fighters' contracts for fights divide 80% of the money - the last 20% goes to the winner (so a 50/50 split would be more like a 40/40/20 split). That makes it a prizefight. Second, judges should have to be part of the post-fight press conference or be interviewed and answer for their cards.

idk, it's not dead but there's just no hype to it and it feels like there's nobody emerging to take Canelo's star.

[Thuglife Nelo]

Right.

But don't forget, the fragmentation of titles started decades ago. When IBF came out in 1983 or so, it already looked like the end, after WBA and WBC had started to separate the rankings.

What I'm trying to say is, enjoy the fighters. At the end of the day, we can still see good, sometimes great fights, even if they do not match the best vs the best.

One must adapt to the era we live in. Not only in boxing, unfortunately.

As crazy as it may be, perhaps it takes a legendary fighter to build another great fighter. Best thing to happen to Canelo was Bhop and Oscar guiding him. Like most business relationships in life in all industries, they can turn to bitter ends, BUT, it Oscar had been like Floyd, perhaps Canelo would be stagnating like Davis. Or who knows, maybe Canelo would’ve always been a great fighter. His techniques show it. Arum has his rap sheet of legendary fights and did his part. King did too, but that guy was a snake for the fine prints…

A lot of boxing fans coming from previous generation fighters and promoters don’t like Eddie Hearn. There are many reasons for this. I think fans don’t like his optimistic personality. For the most part Hearn is a very busy guy and is really about making an impression for the best events. He will have a long way to go, but he’s in the right direction.

the worst from them all that has a paradoxical exemption is Al Haymon. A guy who colluded to steal fighters from another outfit, paid for them, and then used stipends and equities to stimulate loyalty. The thing is, if the fighter doesn’t complain about it, then in reality it isn’t affected by Ali Acts.

i could provide a known fighter $1mil for a fight and say, “I’ve got this lined up for you.” This is what a master mind financial advisor can do. The only essential thing that’s wrong with this for fans whom want to see particular fights is that it water downs the hunger like the old days.

take the Charlo vs Jacobs altercation. Jermall told Jacobs “we can skip our fights (Centeno) and Sulecki” knowing that it’s not that simple. The Charlo’s are very deceiving fighters imo.

[Johnny Rubber]

Not dead, but not the sport it once was. Boxing isn't taken as seriously by the fighters or fans anymore, so promoters have more control now and can make money without risking the cash cows. All things considered belts are similar to participation trophies now, so decent money can be earned without ever fighting for a notable strap.

NSB is a good indicator of how far boxing has slipped by simply looking at the threads and comments. People don't really discuss fights openly like they once did, it's mostly about insulting other fans' ethnicity, opinions and knowledge now.

[soul_survivor]

Well we just had all the marbles at light middle go to a draw, between a guy no one knows and a guy a few people know who should have been primed and ready and taken out the journeyman he was facing. Yep, the sport is dead and as much as promoters are to blame, the fans were/are a bigger problem.

[rickJen]

Eddie Hearn added nails in the coffin by paying too much money.
Showtime Espinoza is bitter, and he's now gradually inching towards
focusing on MMA where fighters are not as greedy as the ones in boxing.

[tonysoprano]

It's not dead, just different. The business model has changed for fighters.

Before you had to get near a world title and then fight contenders to make the serious money. Now with the promoters and TV companies you get a world title and they can market you without fighting the top contenders. You still make serious money.

For fighters and promoters it's arguably a better deal. For fans it sucks because you don't get to see the era defining fights often enough.