The ring magazine is as ******ed as the alphabet gangs

[Lester Tutor]

The Lineal opportunity has been for auction at 15 million. Loeffler is a champion at eBay too, bidding on cheap things...

[Scipio2009]

I'm not the biggest fan of ggg and personally I think he's destroyed by the first elite fighter he faces but I give him credit for cleaning out the 160lbs division. With that said how the fucl can the ring magazine the supposed "bible of boxing" keep canelo as their mw champ? He flat out ran from a fight with ggg and now is exclusive at 154lbs. The hypocrisy of the ring is incredible and they cannot be taken seriously by any fan.

Golden Boy Magazine (formally Ring Magazine) has been owned by Oscar De La Hoya for years at this point, and has lost any of it's remaining objectivity probably at around the time Oscar formally booted Schaefer from running the day-to-day operations at Golden Boy.

Not sure from where your shock is coming from, tbh

[Scipio2009]

Because the Ring is supposed to try and follow Lineal champions. Lineal was created because of fighters losing titles outside the ring. Stripping a fighter goes against why "Lineal" was created. No rules have been broken.

Canelo is the Lineal MW champ every boxing site recognises him as such, why wouldn't the ring?

Ring Magazine has stripped Stevenson and Rigondeaux, yet they've never fathomed striping Alvarez. Nice try, though

[Robbie Barrett]

Ring Magazine has stripped Stevenson and Rigondeaux, yet they've never fathomed striping Alvarez. Nice try, though

Stevenson and Rigondeuax didn't fight a top 5 fighter in 2 years, which is why they were stripped. That's in the ring rules.

[Pugilisticuffs]

It's not the Ring this time. Of course they're biased for Canelo but most everyone else has Canelo as #1 at MW: tbrb, boxing scene, ESPN afaik. It's cause all go by the same broken rules. The ring is better sometimes, they'll warn and strip deadbeat champs but not in this case

The TBRB only goes by Lineal champ as their #1 guy or "true champion", so that's why. Their patience is also wearing quite thin with Canelo's catchweight & stalling antics. Check out what Springs Toledo wrote about that one on their site's discussion forum under "Feedback" at the bottom of that page.

BoxingScene also uses the TBRB's rankings, they adopted them a while back & still recognize/mention The Ring's lineal. So, naturally they'll also have Canelo ranked as #1 at MW too because according to The Ring & the TBRB (for now) he's still the lineal champ.

ESPN usually goes by who is recognized as lineal as well, per Dan Rafael, except they do NOT recognize Canelo as the Lineal MW champ anymore. In fact, Canelo isn't even ranked in their divisional Top 10 MW rankings. Jacobs is the #2 ranked MW fighter in the world according to their updated list. Canelo is ranked #1 at Junior Middleweight there.

Feb 21, 2017
Dan Rafael
ESPN Senior Writer

Check out my rankings within each division by clicking on the links below. If there is a lineal champion in a weight class, he is ranked No. 1.

Who is the best fighter regardless of weight class? See ESPN's pound-for-pound rankings.

For a list of the current champions in all weight classes, click here.

Note: Results through Feb. 20. In an effort to provide the most up-to-date rankings, ESPN.com's division-by-division boxing rankings will be updated every Tuesday.

MIDDLEWEIGHT DIVISION (UP TO 160 POUNDS)

1. Gennady Golovkin (36-0)

Unified middleweight titlist Gennady Golovkin has been waiting for a fight against Canelo Alvarez.

Unified titleholder Golovkin hoped (like most boxing fans) that Canelo Alvarez would fight him this year in what had been a mandatory fight. But Alvarez fled, giving up his alphabet belt and saying he might fight Golovkin in the fall of 2017. Titleholder Billy Joe Saunders also blatantly ducked GGG after calling him out, and the same goes for contender Chris Eubank Jr., with whom they were far down the road to a deal. With the top middleweights outright avoiding GGG, he took on willing welterweight titlist Kell Brook in September on Brook's turf in London and broke his face, literally, in a fifth-round knockout victory to retain his title for the 17th consecutive time and record his 23rd KO in a row. A showdown with secondary titlist and mandatory challenger Daniel Jacobs (32-1) was penciled in for Dec. 10, but, when the sides said they couldn't make a deal in time to do the fight then, they agreed to keep talking and finally got it done.

ESPN's Middleweight Divisional Rankings

BoxRec's computerized divisional rankings don't recognize Canelo as #1 either, they recognize GGG as #1. They have Canelo ranked #1 at Junior Middleweight also, which is where he last fought and won a major world title.

BoxRec's Middleweight Divisional Rankings

[LoadedWraps]

How? Because Oscar owns it and Canelo is a Golden Boy fighter that's their cash cow, raking in over 90% of their $ annually. It's a conflict of interest and politics that are allowing him to keep their "lineal" title. Canelo changed weight classes by fighting Liam Smith at 154 (JMW) and now he's fighting JCC Jr. at a catchweight within the Super Middleweight weight range. He's never even fought at the Middleweight upper limit of 160, yet, he's recognized as the Middleweight lineal champion.

The Ring lost virtually all of its credibility years ago, especially after they controversially changed their lineal championship policy in 2012. This is why the TBRB was formed by former members of The Ring's board.

Basically this.


As much as I love ODLH the fighter, as a promoter, he's as corrupt as they come.

[Robbie Barrett]

It was designed so that good champs like Sergio don't get stripped for not fighting bogus #1 contenders like Zbik cause they cant get a TV date. Not so that a bogus 155 lineal champ doesn't get stripped for saying he's too small, moves down in weight, and surrenders the belt to universal #1 contender/unified champ.

See the difference? In one case the champ was too good for the fight. Other, the champ is not big or good enough. How can you be MW lineal if you're not a MW? That's a minimum requirement

I don't care about your opinion. The fact is Canelo is Lineal. Deal with it.

[Real King Kong]

Ring Magazine has stripped Stevenson and Rigondeaux, yet they've never fathomed striping Alvarez. Nice try, though

He had 18 months to schedule a fight at mw...so he should be stripped in may.

[Robbie Barrett]

The TBRB only goes by Lineal champ as their #1 guy or "true champion", so that's why. Their patience is also wearing quite thin with Canelo's catchweight & stalling antics. Check out what Springs Toledo wrote about that one on their site's discussion forum under "Feedback" at the bottom of that page.

BoxingScene also uses the TBRB's rankings, they adopted them a while back & still recognize/mention The Ring's lineal. So, naturally they'll also have Canelo ranked as #1 at MW too because according to The Ring & the TBRB (for now) he's still the lineal champ.

ESPN usually goes by who is recognized as lineal as well, per Dan Rafael, except they do NOT recognize Canelo as the Lineal MW champ anymore. In fact, Canelo isn't even ranked in their divisional Top 10 MW rankings. Jacobs is the #2 ranked MW fighter in the world according to their updated list. Canelo is ranked #1 at Junior Middleweight there.


ESPN's Middleweight Divisional Rankings

BoxRec's computerized divisional rankings don't recognize Canelo as #1 either, they recognize GGG as #1. They have Canelo ranked #1 at Junior Middleweight also, which is where he last fought and won a major world title.

BoxRec's Middleweight Divisional Rankings

ESPN and Boxrec never name Lineal champs. Boxrec has Canelo P4P #1 too. Nice try.

[original zero]

Stevenson and Rigondeuax didn't fight a top 5 fighter in 2 years, which is why they were stripped. That's in the ring rules.

that's not how lineal works.

and it's a rule that was invented so they could strip stevenson. because HBO desperately wanted ward-kovalev to be "lineal."

we already have proof ring magazine was coordinating with golden boy to create a smear campaign against al haymon.

ring magazine is meaningless now.