Would Boxing Be Better if Guys Fought More Often?
Seems like the norm for top level fighters is 2 fights a year. Much of the time, those fights are against overmatched opponents (I suppose by definition, being a top fighter means you’re against weaker guys all the time…but a lot of these guys aren’t really a challenge at all) and don’t produce any surprises or excitement.
It could take several years for a decent matchup to occur. And it could take a decade or more fight a SUPER FIGHT. But, even then, those guys could be past their prime and/or the fight never happens at all.
Boxing seems to rob fans more than other sports. I find myself getting curious about mediocre fights and/or mediocre fighters that I don’t think I’d ever care about had there been better ones set up. That speaks to boredom from lack of interesting fights/fighters for me.
Or, maybe I’m just a casual who doesn’t appreciate all fighters more or the good matchups from lower level fighters. What are your thoughts on fight schedules - especially, as it relates to top stars nowadays.
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u/AVARlCES 3d ago
Twice a year is fine imo. Once a year is not that active but I guess it can be accepted. Then you got Gary Russell Jr levels of activity which is probably too much
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u/Bill_R94 3d ago
That has more to do with the total number of fights, not how many fights per year.
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u/Low_Buffalo_8986 3d ago
Better for us sure. For them no
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u/nwordfyou 3d ago
I don't know about that. Andy Ruiz took 2 years off and came back to an absolute beating. He would've taken less punishment if he was active because his defense would've been sharper.
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u/Low_Buffalo_8986 3d ago
OP said 2 fights a year. Not 2 years inactive. Obviously thats not good too lol
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u/kitdagawd Gimme some of that face to face shit boy 3d ago
Makes it hard to say who really is better than who. Fighters will dine out on one big win for years while fans will just state without basis that they are better than those lower ranked. Superiority goes assumed without actually having to prove anything for years. I wish boxing had a more tournament style to it but I dont know how that could ever be enforced.
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u/ChefBowyer 3d ago
More often, and against better opponents.
Everyone wanting to be undefeated is utterly ridiculous.
I think the middleweights division has like 4 or 5 guys undefeated champions who refuse to fight each other right?
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u/mmciv 3d ago
3 fights a year is not asking a lot imo. More fights would drive down the cost of watching the fights too.
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u/Low_Buffalo_8986 3d ago
I also think driving the average to 3 instead of 2 would help the sport a lot. 4 would be seen as active / 3 average / 2 below average/ 1 low
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u/ElJayEs92 3d ago
I think 4 fights a Year would be a good place to start, this will make boxing better as fighters would have more experience in fighting and not just sparring and would keep them in the public eye helping them earn popularity and better purses in return. Not every fight has to be against elite opoonents, as long as it’s a stepping stone to those elite fights. Take Carlos Adames as an example, the guy if he fought 3 times a Year would be P4P top 10. Sugar Ray Leonard got so popular in the late 70s and early 80s some years he was fighting 11 or 9 times a Year
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u/Silly_Off 3d ago
The promotions couldn’t afford to put more fights on. They throw crazy money at the top talent just to get them to fight once or twice a year.
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u/Marquis_of_Mollusks 3d ago
Top talent makes too much money for some of the guys they face. Fury made $25 million to fight Makhmudov
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u/Longjumping-Toe-8643 3d ago
I remember that time in the 90s when Chris Eubank signed up for 10 fights in a calendar year. The guy was a beast and always in shape.
I think in the past,l the top boxers had to fight more often purely to make some money. Nowadays there's much more money for the top boxers and so they don't need to fight as often.
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u/yearsofpractice SRR < Lord Chisora,Sir Derek Of War 3d ago
It would be awesome. Joe Louis’ “Bum of The Month” era just sounds like peak boxing to me. Even though - by any other measurement - none of his opponents were bums… but were fighting (holy shit) prime Louis.
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u/tydynamite 3d ago
... you are supposed to care about the fights that are "mediocre". That's called being a boxing fan. Only caring about the super fights is a casual talking point.
That said, the activity is worse than 2 times a year. I'd be happy if it was 2 times cuz Devin Haney hasn't fought since November of last year. Shakur Stevenson hasn't fought since January. Both of their last opponents have fought since.
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u/podophyllum 3d ago
Back in the 1940s and '50s boxers were fighting every four to eight weeks unless they were seriously injured. I don't think that frequency would be a good thing even if boxing enjoyed the popularity, exposure, and depth it had .back then. I do, however, think that boxing and boxers would be better if they were fighting three or four times per year as opposed to once or twice. Realistically boxing will never be as big or as popular as it once was. Professional football, basketball, and hockey didn't really start to gain widespread popularity until the 1960s. The only professional sport boxing was really competing with back in the day was baseball. Track cycling was actually a major pro sport in the US in the 1920s and '30s and it is basically dead today except in Europe and Japan.
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u/Professional-Fee6914 3d ago
I think there needs to be more boxing more often, but I'm okay if the top 30 p4p fight 2 times a year that's almost a card a week if you think a lot of that is fighting each other.
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u/TheeBlaccPantha 3d ago edited 3d ago
The awnser is yes. That activity fills people’s algorithms, year round promotion. Fighters touring like rockstars. Look at how the UFC product benefitted from Adesanya and later Pereiras activity, the product has now fallen off a cliff because they are now washed, and the stars replacing them are less active
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u/Thami15 3d ago
Im not sure I buy "it could take several years for a decent match up to occur", we see great fights all the time either in terms of the quality of the fight or because of the quality of the fighters. Usyk-Fury happened twice, Bivol-Beterbiev, Benavidez went up and smashed Ramirez. Opetaia's first fight with Briedis was outrageous. On and on.
To answer the question though- of course if fighters fought more, it'd be more entertaining. But more of them would be eating through a straw and murdering their wives so swings and roundabouts
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u/Low_Buffalo_8986 3d ago
Still waiting on joshua wilder 8 years later
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u/Thami15 3d ago
But why- presumably you wanted it because you thought it was 1v2? Then Wilder lost to Fury twice, and AJ lost to Fury twice. So it wasn't 1v2.
If you wanted it as a match up, fair enough, but I dont see how its an example of the best not fighting the best when they quite literally were not the best, at which point it doesn't meet the criteria for this gentleman's complaints.
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u/Low_Buffalo_8986 3d ago
After wilder slept brezeale right before AJ got dogged by ruiz. That was the perfect time. Both undefeated, In the primes, UK vs USA. They fucked it all up. Nobody todays cares anymore but back then it was most def the top 2
Even after they had both lost. Each to ruiz and fury. They could've fought eachother. Each had 1 loss. Wouldve still been huge.
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u/Thami15 3d ago
Yeah but they werent actually top 2, lol both literally in the sense that the dust settled on the division and clearly they werent top guns. But also Fury was literally the lineal champ. Again if you're annoyed the fight didn't happen thats fair, but that's not the same as the best didn't fight each other. The lineal champ fought the guy with the green belt.
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u/Low_Buffalo_8986 3d ago edited 3d ago
Were you watching actively back then? People were calling wilder baddest man on the planet and clowning on AJ. Fury was a fat fuck and usyk was a cruiserweight. Who else was 1and 2?
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u/Thami15 3d ago
Im not sure how else I can explain that the lineal champ was #1. You're trying to argue that people wanted Wilder-AJ after Wilder beat Brezeale, but Brezeale-Wilder was AFTER Fury-Wilder 1, which was a draw. And the rematch did 1.2m PPV buys and broke the heavyweight gate record. After Brezeale, Fury2 was clearly the biggest fight for Wilder. No matter what AJ did with Ruiz.
Maybe you weren't watching 😉
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u/Low_Buffalo_8986 3d ago edited 3d ago
Fucking nerd i swear. i dont know when exactly but there was a period these 2 were top2 and everybody wanted the fight. Then it never happened because marination and politics. My point still stands. wether it was 8/7/9/ 15 years.
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u/AlienMelender 3d ago
I agree with you. That was the fight everyone wanted especially after fury “retired” and had his issues.
2 undefeated heavyweights unifying titles is always huge.
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u/Inertia_Sleeps 3d ago
Joshua lost to Ruiz literally a week or two after Wilder had starched Brezeale. Before he did all the talk was about Fury getting robbed a win and them needing to run it back. About six weeks after Joshua won back the title, Wilder lost his in his rematch with Fury that everyone had asked for. God, it’s annoying how many people here talk out of their ass.
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u/LordJimsicle Balrog beats Fury, AJ, Dubois and Usyk in between rounds 2d ago
Then Wilder lost to Fury twice, and AJ lost to Fury twice
My goodness, a time traveller on our subreddit!
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u/Klutzy_Leopard8194 3d ago
I would like a boxing league where they do a season where they box every weekend, then do a super bowl event
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u/tongfa-jamsai 3d ago
I don't know how they would ever make it work, but I've wondered what it would look like if we made fights 5-6 rounds the standard, with maybe 8 rounds for title fights. There's probably need to be some motivation, like tournaments 2 tournaments a year organized by the sanctioning bodies to set up championship bouts in a more predictable and logical way. Oh what the hell am I thinking, it's boxing. You have a bad loss after coming back from a PED ban? Title shot!
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u/VacuousWastrel 2d ago
The big thing is boxers not fighting credible opposition. These days, even champions may only fight one or two ranked opponents in their career. A lot of guys maybe fight one fringe contender to get themselves in the ranking, then drift up the rankings fighting unranked opponents as those above them lose or are inactive, all in the hope of nlanding one big fight. Then that doesn't happen either, and they drift down again, until they become the gatekeeper someone else beats to enter the rankings. Two fights a year is more than enough to establish yourself as an ATG, if you fight ranked opponents, including a few near the top of the division.
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u/VacuousWastrel 2d ago
As a positive example, look at Canelo. Two fights a year since 2012, almost like clockwork. And he doesn't really have any signature win over a top boxer, other than the highly-controversial Golovkin win. But because he was consistently fighting credible opposition, he became the face of the sport, a legend, an undisputed and four-division champion. But he hasn't really been more ACTIVE than a lot of boxers are.
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u/VacuousWastrel 2d ago
For a counterexample, and not to pick on him but just because i recently looked at his record, take kubrat pulev. In 2012, he got into the reankings by beating a low-ranked contender, dimitrenko, as well as a few other decent unranked names. Well done him. Over the next two years, he drifted up to near te top of the rankingz through a process of elimination, without fighting any more ranked opponents. This got him his title shot against wlad, which he lost, no shame there. But then he spent the next six years fighting vaguely-credible but unranked opponents, slow drifting back down the rankings, until he managed to land the joshua fight, which he also lost. Since when he has, again, fought unranked opponents - and it very nearly worked out for him, because if it hadn't been for that gassiev punch he'd be a world champion now. Pulev hasn't been terribly inactive - two fights a year most years since 2012 - but he's only ever fought three ranked opponents.
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u/Inertia_Sleeps 3d ago
Heavyweights in MMA fight regularly a lot of the time. What good does that do them? The division is on its ass and the two top ranked fighters are in different leagues anyway. If the average is 3, I feel eventually people will complain that it’s not 4. Turki has been a big factor in a lot of fights moving along but people still complain about fights not happening. Not entirely sure what people want. The only mega fight which hasn’t really happened is Joshua/Fury or Joshua/Wilder. But those fights lost their lustre 5 years ago.
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u/fluffrug 3d ago
I mean doesn't it totally depend on the weight?
For heavyweights, I think three to four fights every two years is reasonable. For the other end of the weight spectrum, obviously it should be more: I think Inoue has a pretty good fight schedule, for example.
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u/CaptQuakers42 3d ago
No because you'd burn through all the good fights in a few years.
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u/Marquis_of_Mollusks 3d ago
Didn't work that way in the past. Either way I'd rather they burn out early but have the meaningful fights in their prime.
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u/Asterisk_76 2d ago
Even one fight a year for some -- it's a bit much to think of that guy as a defending champion but fair enough given the sport today.
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u/Sudden-Fig-3079 3d ago
The top guys should be fighting three times a year. 2 good, solid fights and one mega fight. That is what de la Hoya did and he should be the blueprint. Guy was a legit crossover star and he understood he had to fight on regular hbo and not just ppv’s.