How hard is it to be a "World Champ"
28.01 - You walk into a boxing gym, and you are met by a fighter who says, "Hi, my name is Joe Soap and I am the welterweight champion of the world." Great, good for him. Now the thought that would cross my mind is, of which organisation? Lets be honest, fifty years ago to be a World Champ meant something, eight divisions, one champion in each, now days you have something like 15 or 16 organisations and now officially 17 weight divisions. This article is not intended to knock any of the sanctioning bodies, but just to put my point across to you, the boxing fan, how boxing has REALLY changed over the years.
I recently, on my visit to Cape Town two weeks ago, bumped in to the former world bantamweight champion in the 1950`s Robert Cohen, I spoke briefly to him about the current crop of "World" Champions, and his reply was simply "which champions are you referring to? There are just so many!"
That I guess that sums it up. There are too many. In a way, this is killing our sport called the noble art. In another way, all these "world" titles are giving our fighters an opportunities to earn a living and live a decent life. I guess it is up to us, the boxing fan to decide and determine who the real champions are.
But what about the people who are not boxing fans, and are just sport fans, occasionally watching boxing, are they not being conned by all these "world" title tags?
Television stations are required at times, when giving a promoter a television date, to include a "world" title, and that again makes way for all the rubbish that we are seeing on our television screens. Sure put together, a world title fight but at least make it competitive, not one sided.
This ruling now, that some sanctioning bodies will let any fighter who is rated by the independant top 100 rating sytem fight for their "World" title. Please, give me a break! That means the champion can now defend against a challenger who is rated 99th in the World?! Interim titles?Don't even go there and get me started.That is just an excuse for confusion.
Everyone is entitled to make a living but at least give us some quality matches. Boxing in this day and age, surely deserves it.
My list of the "real" world champions are as follows:
Heavyweight-Lennox Lewis
Super Cruiserweight-who cares
Cruiserweight-Vassily Jirov
Lightheavyweight-Roy Jones
Super-middleweight-Joe Calzaghe
Middleweight-Bernard Hopkins
Jnr. Middleweight-Oscar De La Hoya
Welterweight-Ricardo Mayorga]
Jnr. welterweight-Kostya Tszyu
Lightweight-Floyd Mayweather
Jnr.lightweight-Acelino Freitas
Featherweight-Marco Barrera
Jnr. feather- Manny Pacquiao
Bantamweight-Tim Austin
Jnr.bantamweight-Masanori Tokuyama
Flyweight-Eric Morel
Jnr.Flyweight-Yosam Choi
Straweight-Jose Aguirre
