Sanctioning Bodies: Why has this been allowed?

I hate 'em. But I have a few questions. At one point, it was just the WBA and WBC, a situation that I can probably deal with. It's not so bad. Having 2 groups could even be beneficial in some ways.

But in 1982-83, the IBF got into the mix. Why was this allowed/embraced? And can someone tell me how they still exist after the fraud case with Bob Lee over a decade ago? How did they manage to shrug that off?

Then in the late-80's the WBO got into it. I remember it was like a joke at the time. Even their name was goofy. Oh, we already have the WBC, the WBA, and you're gonna be the WBO? Whatever. Now it saddens me to see how they've taken their place among the other groups. Who woulda predicted it? Everyone was already pissed that there were 3 organizations, so how did a 4th one make it?

And then each group started up with the interim bs, the super champs, the diamond belt, and all the other crap. How much can we take? And why is there not more of an upsurge of protest about this? I remember guys in the 80's railing against this. Well, it's 10X worse now, so why not more outrage?

Part of the problem is guys have changed their tune a bit. Lou DiBella used to say how the sanctioning groups were a scourge. Now he's talking about what an honor it is for his guy to fight for the WBC title. Nothing against him, he has a different gig now, but the dissenting voices have grown rather silent as this sanctioning body sewage runs amok.

Fighters allow this to go on and promoters just want to have champions. Just more appealing for these guys. I can careless about this point and soon more and more people will.

It's just that they keep crossing the invisible line in the sand. My pops grew up watching boxing with one world champ in each division. I had 2, then 3. OK, that sucks, but I'm still in. Then a 4th! Hey wait a second, wtf is this? Add in interim champs and a dozen other twists. Now you've gone way to far.

the problem is that now i dont know how we get rid of it. they are not good for the sport. a few people are getting rich off of it while the rest of us have to suffer through it. can we protest and say that we will only recognize one belt?

Promoters: Belts are nothing but promotional tool. When the belts go against what they want, they got no problem having their fighters drop them, and go after another belt.

Fighters: Belts mean more money. Add on, belts have become the same as trophies to the losers. So many medicre fighters that if there was only one belt, they'd never get close to one.

Networks: They are the ones that empowered ABC belts by recognizing them. They are ignorant to the sport of boxing, and still feel that title fights mean something to people.

If that was the case, HBO World Championship boxing wouldn't be getting record low ratings. Do you think anyone bought Pac-Mosley because the WBO belt was on the line?

Why I'll keep beating my drum that networks and ignorant media just need to ignore them. Refer to them as titles only, and not even by name.

Powerpuncher, Grant, good points. You both paint a dire picture, there just is so much to overcome to get it back on the right track. Everyone down the line is contributing to the current system and stands to gain from it one way or another.

There needs to be a collective effort. The writers need to ignore the bodies, just never refer to them. Then someone could maybe unify everyone and create a better system, but it seems so futile. You're never going to get the fighters to stop fighting for "world" titles. These groups would need to be defeated on a military level to stop them. A country would literally need to declare actual war against these guys for anything to change it seems. Sad.

GrantZilla wrote:Promoters: Belts are nothing but promotional tool. When the belts go against what they want, they got no problem having their fighters drop them, and go after another belt.

Fighters: Belts mean more money. Add on, belts have become the same as trophies to the losers. So many medicre fighters that if there was only one belt, they'd never get close to one.

Networks: They are the ones that empowered ABC belts by recognizing them. They are ignorant to the sport of boxing, and still feel that title fights mean something to people.

If that was the case, HBO World Championship boxing wouldn't be getting record low ratings. Do you think anyone bought Pac-Mosley because the WBO belt was on the line?

Why I'll keep beating my drum that networks and ignorant media just need to ignore them. Refer to them as titles only, and not even by name.

thats a great point. in any sport there is a champion. boxing has kind of become an opinion on who the champion is rather than actually having one.

It's impossible to stop them. As long as they are a legitimate business, anybody can do it. I've been saying for years that we should start our own just to fuck with them. Make it a non-profit and charge next to nothing for sanctioning fees. Maybe we can dry up some of these ABC's.

I think they you can get rid of them if networks like Showtime and HBO wised up that titles mean jack shit to viewers. That they wise up and realize that all they are doing is turning off casual fans by mentioning every bogus ABC belt, and confusing the hell out of them.

I've along with others have said, just recognize The Ring rankings and the Ring/linear belt. This will make it simple for casual fans to know who the top fighters are and who the Champs are.

"But the Ring is just a magazine." So what. ABC belts have no power at all. They don't sanction fights. The states and countries do, and the promoters. UFC is not a sanctioning body, they are a promotional company, but the UFC belt is recognized by MMA fans as The Belt.

There no doubt in my mind HBO Championship boxing would go up when a real Ring/linear title is on the line and people recognize that it is THE BELT, and not some bogus trinket.

I'd make a lengthy post about this, but Grant and I bang the drum for death to the sanctioning organizations ad nauseum(so I'll keep it short). I'm to the point that I just call everyone a trinket holder unless they have the ring title.

You see some writers and fans of the same opinion as all of us (Kellerman, Fat Dan-one of his only redeeming qualities is his hatred for the organizations), but alot of writers(especially European ones) and fans don't care.

Bad Left Hook, doghousboxing, and a few other sites only recognize Ring/linear Champs.

But yeah, until Showtime or HBO show some balls and ignore the belts, the problem will continue.

IF HBO ignored the ABC belts, everyone else would fall in line.

ScottLevinson wrote:Powerpuncher, Grant, good points. You both paint a dire picture, there just is so much to overcome to get it back on the right track. Everyone down the line is contributing to the current system and stands to gain from it one way or another.

There needs to be a collective effort. The writers need to ignore the bodies, just never refer to them. Then someone could maybe unify everyone and create a better system, but it seems so futile. You're never going to get the fighters to stop fighting for "world" titles. These groups would need to be defeated on a military level to stop them. A country would literally need to declare actual war against these guys for anything to change it seems. Sad.

..all good posts and reasons how and why they should be gone.i like scotts suggestion the best.litterly its a united declare war effort on these scumbags.

War is giving them too much attention. If they were ignored by the networks and media, they would die.

They rely on fighters, especialy big name fighters, sanctioning fees. Soon as big names start doing a Mayweather and refusing to pay sanctioning fees, they'd die. WBC already on brink of going bankrupt.

If fighters stopped getting credited for their meaningless trinket, they're not going to want to pay sanctioning fees for it. They want to be recognized as a Champion.

Fuck the belts we need to have big ass trophies instead of belts!!

nano212 wrote:Fuck the belts we need to have big ass trophies instead of belts!!

awesome.

if we did a fake belt thing to be awarded, we could call it Big Ass Trophy. LOL.

Good ideas all of ya. It's just so hard to eliminate stuff that is so embedded. Getting rid of sanctioning bodies is almost as daunting a proposition as eliminating illegal drugs from society.

What if we made a compromise? We allow them to exist and mention them under the following conditions:

There is an oversight committee that:

1. Pushes constantly for unification matches.
2. Ensures the rankings are in-step.
3. Never allows for mandatories to get in the way of meaningful fights.
4. Eliminates all the interim, super champ, and diamond belt horseshit. One champ per division for each organization. Even that's way too much, hence rule #1.
5. The sanctioning fee never is over 5 figures.

It'd be a start.

Just ignore them all together. Fuck the sanctioning bodies. They will never change their ways.

There power is by being recognized. When Showtime mentions the WBO strap constantly during the Pac fight, it makes the WBO belt come off as legit.

If belts were given no credit by the media and networks, fighters would stop paying extortion, I mean, sanctioning fees to them.

Wishfull thinking, my hope is whoever takes Greenberg's job knows boxing and knows people don't care about belts anymore.

it all comes down to money. even though these fighters have to pay sanctioning fees, they are getting more money per fight because of their trinket. once fighters are at the top i dont think that they care as much because they know that their name is already out there and it only matters who they beat and not what trinket they have. so i really dont think that anything will be done by the sanctioning bodies or the fighters. like grant said, HBO and showtime have to stop recognizing them and so do any major boxing website. but thats like getting all of the peasants together to fight against the king and his knights. although there are way more of us and we could probably win, most people dont want to put in that kind of effort.

ScottLevinson wrote:Good ideas all of ya. It's just so hard to eliminate stuff that is so embedded. Getting rid of sanctioning bodies is almost as daunting a proposition as eliminating illegal drugs from society.

What if we made a compromise? We allow them to exist and mention them under the following conditions:

There is an oversight committee that:

1. Pushes constantly for unification matches.
2. Ensures the rankings are in-step.
3. Never allows for mandatories to get in the way of meaningful fights.
4. Eliminates all the interim, super champ, and diamond belt horseshit. One champ per division for each organization. Even that's way too much, hence rule #1.
5. The sanctioning fee never is over 5 figures.

It'd be a start.

I sometimes write articles for the front page of this place and was working on a BCS-like formula for boxing rankings. I still gave the four "major" organizations some power but it was skewed to really be Ring and boxrec rankings. Grant was supposed to do a Super 6 article so I never finished mine.

UBeeg9cats wrote:It'd be a start.

I sometimes write articles for the front page of this place and was working on a BCS-like formula for boxing rankings. I still gave the four "major" organizations some power but it was skewed to really be Ring and boxrec rankings. Grant was supposed to do a Super 6 article so I never finished mine. [/quote]

Do it. Right when I was going to do the Super-Six article, I had to do a bunch of bullshit at the office.

I'd be interested to see how the rankings come out. But if you include ABC or rankings, I don't see how they won't be a mess.

i would love to turn this place into a real boxing website eventually with articles and everything and with legit rankings. it would probably take a while to do though. maybe we could start the change.