Would Boxing Be Better Off If?

Question

They made it mandatory for belt holders to fight the number one contander every fight while being the belt holder to ensure that fighters are Consistently fighting the best.

Answer 1

yes i think it would they should also make them have at least a cirtin amount of title defences in a year like 3 title defences and like 3 non title fights

Answer 2

while it looks good on paper, the number one contender is not necessarily the best in the division, but looking at this another way, too many wars can burn a fighter out, so why not take a  relatively easy fight now and again (but JUST now and again).

good question.

Answer 3

No, because the sanctioning bodies' rankings are corrupted and DO NOT represent the best fighters in the world.  A perfect example would be Kelly Pavlik's mandatory defense against the WBO's mandatory challenger Gary Lockett.  Lockett has not done anything worthwile to deserve a shot at the championship, but yet he is the WBO's number one contender.  And its not just the WBO; look at all of the sanctioning bodies' rankings and you'll see that there are fighters on there that have not fought more than 8 rounds or have not beaten any worthwile opponents.  What you speak of would work if there were unbiased rankings and if there was one championship for each division like there were in the olden days.  Thats why The Ring Magazine came up with their championship policy in 2002 to give the TRUE championship belts to the fighters who really deserve it and have earned the right to be called a champion.  The Ring does not have worthless mandatory defenses or strip their champions of their belts like band-aids.  The only way that you can lose The Ring belt is in the ring, if you move to another weight division, or retire- thats the way it used to be and thats the way it should be; these sanctioning bodies are all in it for the money and could care less about the fighters or the betterment of the sport.  I have the utmost respect for The Ring's championship policy because it has helped to distinguish the true champions from the paper ones, or the ones who just have belts, but not the true championship. Thats the main reason why I only consider The Ring's titleholders to be the true, linear champs; I consider everyone else who has a title (WBC, WBO, WBA, IBF) just that- a "titleholder."

Answer 4

i think what you are saying is true and would be best for the sport but the sad fact is its all bout witch fight generates the most cash and some champs such as Floyd Mayweather dont want to lose his perfect record so he picks the easy fight that he knows he can win