If we get a unified HW champion, what comes next?

[N/A]

It’s actually quite impressive how Wlad managed to keep so many sanctioning bodies happy for so long and never had to vacate any titles.

Keeping the belts together is very easy. Just fight the mandatories. There's no such thing as conflicting mandatories. Holyfield sued years ago, which lead to the creation of the rotation system. As long as you fight your mandatories in order, you can't be stripped.

But fighters want to remain champion as long as possible and they'd rather ditch a belt or two to maximize the chances of keeping at least one belt for as long as they can. The fewer mandatories you have, the more you can cherry pick to protect your belt(s).

[MasterPlan]

Move up to Super Heavyweight... wait.

[german12johnson]

Usyk, Gasiev, Dorktikos, Briedis Are coming.

You dont believe that

[Scipio2009]

Pause, for a moment

Let's imagine for a minute that AJ and Wilder happens and one or the other wins all the belts. We will indeed briefly have the WBA, WBC, IBF, WBO, Ring and IBO belts all sitting proudly around the waist of one man...

So what happens then? You can't keep all the belts, it would be ridiculous. You would soon collapse under a sea of conflicing mandatories and besides, why would you want to pay all those sanctioning fees?

I don't think by that point you need the belts anyway. You are the man. Everyone knows it. So you can relinquish, but do you vacate one, two, three or more of them?

I suspect Wilder would retain the WBC and AJ maybe the IBF as they've held them for the longest time. It's nice to still have that title after all and it gives you something to wear after the fight. Then let the others go and eventually fight the winners of them every so often to drive up interest?

I think I'd vacate the lot. You keep the Ring of course, no sanctioning fees there. I think however I'd keep the IBO as well. Just for giggles. All of a sudden all those sanctioning authorities would be offering belts that wouldn't mean as much as the poor ol' IBO belt, because it would be the only one that hadn't been cast aside by the division number one.

So that's my choice. I'd make the IBO the world's greatest belt. What would you do?

-The WBC, WBA, and IBF have already gone to great strides to respect each other's mandatory defenses and better align the timing.

-The only mandatory defense currently owed by any of the sanctioning bodies is the WBO's title defense by Povetkin (with the winner of the Oquendo-Charr fight being owed a shot at the WBA).

-No body has heavyweight final eliminators lined up yet

Wilder and Joshua fight (if not this summer, they fight at the end of the year, with Joshua having settled the WBO obligation).

With no other mandatory due (unsure of when Oquendo-Charr is supposed to happen), you can freely plan the rematch.

After the rematch, the undisputed champion fights the WBA mandatory (Oquendo-Charr winner), followed by the IBF mandatory (Miller-Duhaupas winner vs Whyte/Pulev to determine), then the WBC mandatory (who knows, tbh) and the WBO mandatory (rules aren't clear, but it's my guess that Tyson Fury or the Usyk-Gassiev winner will get that shot), and the the cycle starts again, with voluntary defenses thrown in as time opens up.

Joshua-Povetkin (WBO mandatory)
Wilder-Breazeale (stay busy)

Joshua-Wilder (undisputed)

Joshua-Wilder 2 (undisputed)

-vs Oquendo-Charr winner (WBA)
-vs Pulev/Whyte/Miller winner (IBF)
-vs Fury or Usyk/Gassiev (WBO)
-vs WBC mandatory (???)

Back to the IBF.

Assuming no real injuries happen, Wilder and Joshua are both fit enough to fight three times a year, with things spaced out to get to Jan/Feb 2020 without much issue.

Giving up whatever the amount ends up being to sanction all of the belts won't come cheap, but there's an added value that comes with being the sole heavyweight champion that makes up for it.

[chaosisme]

One thing I like about the IBO is that they don't have mandatories. They aren't going to force a guy like Fres Oquendo (or someone along those lines) as the mandatory challenger.

[RJJ-94-02=GOAT]

Keeping the belts together is very easy. Just fight the mandatories. There's no such thing as conflicting mandatories. Holyfield sued years ago, which lead to the creation of the rotation system. As long as you fight your mandatories in order, you can't be stripped.

But fighters want to remain champion as long as possible and they'd rather ditch a belt or two to maximize the chances of keeping at least one belt for as long as they can. The fewer mandatories you have, the more you can cherry pick to protect your belt(s).

I wouldn’t say it’s easy at all, barely any fighter has consistently defended all 4 belts since the WBO’s inception.
Mandatories aside, the sanctioning fee’s are exorbitant, I’m surprised Wlad continually paid fees to so many organisations fight after fight.

[Vinnykin]

-The WBC, WBA, and IBF have already gone to great strides to respect each other's mandatory defenses and better align the timing.

-The only mandatory defense currently owed by any of the sanctioning bodies is the WBO's title defense by Povetkin (with the winner of the Oquendo-Charr fight being owed a shot at the WBA).

-No body has heavyweight final eliminators lined up yet

Wilder and Joshua fight (if not this summer, they fight at the end of the year, with Joshua having settled the WBO obligation).

With no other mandatory due (unsure of when Oquendo-Charr is supposed to happen), you can freely plan the rematch.

After the rematch, the undisputed champion fights the WBA mandatory (Oquendo-Charr winner), followed by the IBF mandatory (Miller-Duhaupas winner vs Whyte/Pulev to determine), then the WBC mandatory (who knows, tbh) and the WBO mandatory (rules aren't clear, but it's my guess that Tyson Fury or the Usyk-Gassiev winner will get that shot), and the the cycle starts again, with voluntary defenses thrown in as time opens up.

Joshua-Povetkin (WBO mandatory)
Wilder-Breazeale (stay busy)

Joshua-Wilder (undisputed)

Joshua-Wilder 2 (undisputed)

-vs Oquendo-Charr winner (WBA)
-vs Pulev/Whyte/Miller winner (IBF)
-vs Fury or Usyk/Gassiev (WBO)
-vs WBC mandatory (???)

Back to the IBF.

Assuming no real injuries happen, Wilder and Joshua are both fit enough to fight three times a year, with things spaced out to get to Jan/Feb 2020 without much issue.

Giving up whatever the amount ends up being to sanction all of the belts won't come cheap, but there's an added value that comes with being the sole heavyweight champion that makes up for it.

Imagine writing all that and then realising that it's the WBA mandatory being forced (Povetkin is the #1 in the WBA and WBO, but the WBO was called last year, Parker fought Fury before Joshua).......

Oops...

[N/A]

I wouldn’t say it’s easy at all, barely any fighter has consistently defended all 4 belts since the WBO’s inception.
Mandatories aside, the sanctioning fee’s are exorbitant, I’m surprised Wlad continually paid fees to so many organisations fight after fight.

All excuses fighters use to justify ditching belts when the truth is that they don't want to have to go in tough every fight. Keeping the belts unified is easy. The problem is that you might lose and now someone else has the unified belts and not you.

The sanctioning fees are overstated. The orgs have fee caps, you can negotiate even lower, and some orgs take a lower percentage when you're unified.

The belts don't stay unified because the fighters don't want to lose. Plain and simple. We had a nice stretch in the 80s and 90s with a series of undisputed heavyweight champions, but the title was a hot potato because everyone was going in tough and the title only splintered because Bowe blatantly ducked Lewis.

Would have been easy to keep the belts together. Wouldn't have been easy to beat Lewis. Big difference.

[soul_survivor]

Let's imagine for a minute that AJ and Wilder happens and one or the other wins all the belts. We will indeed briefly have the WBA, WBC, IBF, WBO, Ring and IBO belts all sitting proudly around the waist of one man...

So what happens then? You can't keep all the belts, it would be ridiculous. You would soon collapse under a sea of conflicing mandatories and besides, why would you want to pay all those sanctioning fees?

I don't think by that point you need the belts anyway. You are the man. Everyone knows it. So you can relinquish, but do you vacate one, two, three or more of them?

I suspect Wilder would retain the WBC and AJ maybe the IBF as they've held them for the longest time. It's nice to still have that title after all and it gives you something to wear after the fight. Then let the others go and eventually fight the winners of them every so often to drive up interest?

I think I'd vacate the lot. You keep the Ring of course, no sanctioning fees there. I think however I'd keep the IBO as well. Just for giggles. All of a sudden all those sanctioning authorities would be offering belts that wouldn't mean as much as the poor ol' IBO belt, because it would be the only one that hadn't been cast aside by the division number one.

So that's my choice. I'd make the IBO the world's greatest belt. What would you do?

First off, there's already a unified champion and that is AJ. What you are talking about is undisputed, i.e. no more legitimate belts up for grabs.

Second, it's not so long ago that Wlad held 75% of the belts, paid the sanctioning fees and the orgs did their mandos the way they usually do when there's an undisputed champ = one after the other.

So I see no reason why AJ wouldnt hold onto those belts, especially with the prestige it brings in the division. He might drop one or two along the way but I doubt it happens straight away.

[soul_survivor]

Oh and I'd keep all the belts as long as I could.