How does American boxing rebuild itself, from these dismal days of Floyd Mayweather running from $50,000,000 and James Kirkland getting knocked out by a Japanese journeyman, to the golden days of Leonard, Hearns, Hagler, Tyson, Holmes, Holyfield? Fans and insiders offer their suggestions and inputs?
Philip H. Anselmo: Great answer by Mario Costa in Part 1. I might have to feed off him here, but won?t?I think, initially, HBO can be blamed for boxing?s recent lull. First, there?s Phloyd Fakeweather. HBO?s insistence that he?s pound-for-pound the best in the sport is a travesty. Here?s a guy (Phloyd) who?s a very gifted fighter who has never taken a true chance in his entire career! Not to mention, his fights are one-sided and boring for the most part. Fakeweather won?t fight the best competition, period. And that fight is with Manny Pacquiao, but he won?t take the fight? That?s ridiculous. No wonder MMA is sweeping boxing under the rug. The best fight the best in MMA. What do we get out of boxing?s supposed ?best?? Nothing. And HBO still supports Fakeweather. HBO covers ? or covered ? Manny Pacquiao fights too, eh? Well, he?s a Filipino guy? a star from another country? the absolute BEST in the sport at his weight, right? Then why not televise the Klitschko brothers? Are they not the BEST in their weight class? Heck, they?re amongst boxing?s elite, no matter the weight class. And what a story!
HBO has taken the Heavyweight Championship away from me and anyone else who cares about the lineage of the greatest prize in sports. Showtime and the other pay networks can be blamed here too. Wladimir and Vitali are the absolute best in the division ? they are brothers, and their story is history in the making. We are in the midst of their very unique careers. But instead, HBO invests in fights like Tim Bradley- Devon Alexander? Gimmie a break! That had ?Bore-Fest? written all over it two seconds after the fight was announced.
No offense to Tim, who was trying to make a fight of it, but it was what it was? dull and a letdown.And the Klitschko?s are boring according to HBO?s (sic) Rich Schaeffer? (Schaeffer is not offocially affiliated with HBO, he is the CEO of Golden Boy Promotions). Watch one of Phloyd?s fights? or one of Golden Boy?s up-and-coming ?prospects?? ugh! And how about HBO?s former love affair with club fighter Chris Arreola? Laughable. Straight-up, when the best don?t fight the best, it hurts the sport. And taking the Heavyweight Championship away from the paying customer?s TV set(s) only rubs our noses in the fact our sport is hurting in a bad way.
I heard HBO might suck it up and pick up the Klitschko brother?s next fights? Wladimir vs. Haye, Vitali vs. Adamek? my question is, Is it too late? People need to SEE fighters to give a fuck about them in the first place! Especially Wladimir vs. Haye. That fight should be HUGE but it?s really just a ?core? fan?s fight here in the US, not a fan?s fight, which it should be. Had HBO shown more of Haye, people in the U.S. would know who the heck he is enough to form an opinion. We all know HBO boycotted Wladimir a long time ago. There?s been no build-up. Vitali- Adamek is a dull matchup compared to Wladimir-Haye, but we?ve seen both Adamek and Vitali more than Wladimir-Haye. That?s lame. And that?s the way I see it.
Give us back the Heavyweight Championship and force Phloyd into fighting Pac Man, instead of him forcing YOU OUT of fights, HBO! Spend some friggin? money and make it happen.
Drew Murray: Boxing needs a homegrown white heavyweight?a Brock Lesnar who boxes.
Mark Buchanan: We go back to what has always worked, especially in the gyms. When fighters get money, it sometimes ruins them because they are used to digging and scratching for everything they get. They think they can trust the people that like them, and are often wrong. Nothing is given to the true warrior. He earns everything he gets, especially the sparring partners and they love it, especially if he studies the game. Promoters and managers still take the fighter to be a dummy and often steal from him. Boxing is not a mainstream sport on TV anymore not because of the lack of popularity, but the greed of promoters who want to get the money with pay per view. You never see a bout between contenders on national TV as we use to in the past. It will continue to die as we have all of these organizations.
Elvin Ventucillo: A centralized, single governing body should be established that will rank all boxers across different associations. Rank number 1 and 2 should fight each other, as well as 3 and 4, 5 and 6 and so on, winners improve rank, losers slide down a bit. If a fighter refuses to fight somebody, he should be suspended and slide in the ranking. That way you can be sure, the champion at the top really fought the best and defeated them. That way no cherry-picker and constant retiree like Floyd would get the honor they don?t deserve.
Joe Abba: Here?s my top ten list, in no particular order. 1. Make referees deduct points for excessive holding. It makes people hate watching boxing. 2. Get rid of old judges, and start building up new, impartial ones. They have tainted countless good fights, with bogus decisions3. A Federal boxing commission to regulate the entire sport, provide health care, bargain fair wages for ALL fighters, not just the few rich ones. Then, fighters might consider boxing for a living, instead of the NBA or NFL again?4. Instant replay for disputed calls. This is not 1970. 5. Fire Kery Davis, Ross Greenburg, and the entire staff, and get some new blood in there?.BOXING people, not suits.6. Stricter regulations and requirements for promoters, managers and trainers?this will make better fighters and better fights. 7. Make fighters earn based upon their draw?.If this was true, Andre Berto would not be very wealthy, but Tomasz Adamek would be a multi millionaire.8. Pay bonuses for KO?s and for exciting fights. 9. Good fight cards from top to bottom?.not just the main event. 10. Ask Al Haymon to leave the sport for good.
Zachary Levin: Something Larry Merchant often says, particularly about the heavyweights, is someday someone will come along who will capture the public?s imagination. Just like Tyson did, and Ali before him, And Marciano and Joe Louis. In some ways, it is just that simple. One charismatic figure can change the landscape. Look at what Pacman has done and the affect he?s had on his country. That said, I think that the lethargy of the U.S. boxing scene is the result of numerous systemic problems?too many to recount in a single paragraph. Blame falls on promoters who don?t promote and refuse to work with others and just don?t match the best and against the best consistently, be it for their main events or their undercards. Blame falls on TV execs who make terrible choices and just don?t seem to have a feel or passion for the sport. Blame falls on the nature of the game, the wild west aspect, where there?s no central authority and thus, what should be the sport?s Super Bowl (Pacquiao-Mayweather) doesn?t get made. The inmates truly run the asylum. There is no infrastructure. It?s fine that a major fighter or promoter or network has a degree power and control, but in boxing, they seem to make up all the rules too. See, no one controls a Bob Arum when decides to take his ball and plays by himself. And that shouldn?t be. There should be penalties for exhbiting behavior detrimental to the sport?and the good things he does, does not excuse the bad. Same with all the others. A Gary Shaw should be punished not rewarded when he fails in his duties as a promoter. There?s no oversight and thus no repercussions. But how do you get around this in a free and open, wild west market? I would love to see a great commissioner and central authority overseeing the game. I?d love to see American prizefighting under the auspices of something like the NFL and have a great brand developed. And since it?s one of the most global sports, figure out a way to incorporate the Asian, African and European markets. A pipe dream? Yeah, probably. But U.S. boxing is where it is for a reason. And whether a Kirkland or Berto or Ortiz or whoever fail to deliver, the industry shouldn?t hinge on such things.
Aaron Braunstein: The Undisputed Heavyweight Champion of The World, is the most coveted of all sports awards and prizes. It means The Champ is the strongest, baddest man on the planet. Prizefighting always works off the Heavyweight Champ. For example, when I was a kid we had Ali, you had Tyson, On top of that, the Heavyweight champ must be American and have a controversial life. Ali with Religion, black is beautiful, Tyson with all his legal troubles, Barbara Walters, Robin Givens, etc. Klitschko is too perfect. 40-0 38 KO?S. Not believable to fans. My life isn?t 40-0 more like 40-28. Freudian. No one can relate to the Klitschko Brothers. We must have an American Heavyweight to salvage prizefighting.
Steve Jackson: You could start by finding the likes of a Mark ?Scoop? Malinowski with the drive, love and passion for the sport! But there aren?t that many around with that kind of mind set to learn the sweet science or trainers to teach it for that matter. There will never be another heavyweight boxing era like the sixties and seventies with the likes of a Alonzo Johnson, Charlie Powell, Doug Jones, George Chuvalo, Cleveland Williams, Zora Folley, Eddie Machen, Karl Mildenberger, Thad Spencer, Jerry Quarry, Oscar Bonavena or a Earnie Shavers! And those heavyweights weren?t even champions. I?m not going to say boxing is a dying sport, because it?s been around for so many years, but for 200-pound heavyweights it?s a helluva lot easier to play football, basketball or baseball and you don?t have to worry about taking any shots.Find me the likes of a Mark Malinowski to fix it.
John Scully: Put boxing back on network TV and you have instant rebuild. Maybe start off with two fights a month to draw interest. Or maybe get a series like USA Tuesday Night Fight back on the air. The biggest problem is that Andre Berto and Victor Ortiz, for example, are good fighters but they aren?t nearly as recognizable to boxing fans as Donald Curry was back in 1985 and that?s simply because by that time Donald had been on network TV several times and was known. Actual exposure to people is the only way to make a real name for yourself and the fact is not everybody can afford pay-per-view and not everybody has cable TV. But everyone has network TV.
George Fay: My suggestion would be start with the U.S. Boxing Federation, have them get off their ass and offer coaching and training and start doing what other countries do and help financially those boxers that are willing to and have the ability to commit to a program. Times have changed kids that want to box ? where the hell are they going to get the dollars to do anything in the sport of Boxing? Reach out to those inner city kids and country boys.
(?Muhammad Ali & Howard Cosell? oil painting by Scoop Malinowski)
