Heavyweight title card highlights boxing’s big problems
It’s easy to become cynical if you’re a boxing fan because, quite frankly, there is a lot in the sport to be cynical about.
The proliferation of so-called world champions is one of the things that drives most fans up a wall. There are four major sanctioning bodies in boxing that award title belts: the IBF, WBA, WBC and WBO.
Given that there are 17 weight classes in boxing (some of which have different names for the same division) and four sanctioning bodies, that means there are 68 potential champions, right? No, wrong.
That’s because one of the organizations, the WBA, has something called a “super” champion. You may have seen Adrien Broner lose his WBA welterweight title on Showtime to Marcos Maidana in 2013. And you may have watched on NBC as Broner was beaten by Shawn Porter last June.
But in October, Broner beat Khabib Allakhverdiev for the vacant WBA super lightweight title. Not long after the fight, the WBA “upgraded” Broner from champion to super champion. And so soon, the WBA’s “interim” champion will fight for its “regular” world title to fill the “void” left when Broner was elevated to super champion.
It’s a mess, and nothing more, and it causes fans to lose interest. People can’t logically follow who is a champion and who isn’t. If you care to know, WBA rule C.18 says, “In exceptional circumstances, the Championships Committee and the President may designate a Champion (other than an Interim Champion) as a Super Champion. The President and Committee may establish criteria for a Super Championship.”
So that means there can be, and often is, an interim champion, a regular champion and a super champion all in the same weight class in the WBA.
And that brings us to what is happening Saturday at the Barclays Center in Brooklyn, when two heavyweight championship fights will be broadcast by Showtime.
In the main event, Deontay Wilder will meet Artur Szpilka for the WBC version of the heavyweight title. In the co-main, Vyacheslav “Czar” Glazkov will face Charles Martin for the IBF version of the belt.
If you thought, “Hey, didn’t Tyson Fury defeat Wladimir Klitschko recently to become the IBF champion?” you would be correct. But because Fury agreed to a rematch clause when he signed to face Klitschko, the IBF stripped Fury of its belt because it has rules against immediate rematches, and deemed that Glazkov fight Martin for its title.
If you’ve never heard of Martin, you’re not alone. He’s 22-0-1 with 20 knockouts, which on the surface seems good. But he’s fought a dreadfully poor quality of opposition.
It’s not necessarily that he doesn’t have the talent to compete at the big-league level, it’s just that he hasn’t proven it yet.
Martin getting to fight for the heavyweight title is kind of like a Triple-A pitcher going 10-0 with a 0.95 ERA and 150 strikeouts in 100 innings against high school hitters and getting called up to the majors.
The entire show is a fraud from the standpoint of guys actually qualifying to fight for a championship. But it’s boxing and, sadly, it’s never going to change.
You’re forced as a fan to either accept the idiocy because you love the sport or to walk away from it forever.
The bottom line: You must change because the powers that be in boxing have proven they won’t.
But so many of us will watch, transfixed, because the action can be so compelling. You never know when something may happen that will pull you out of your seat.
Martin, as promoter Lou DiBella said, is a tremendous physical specimen who as an amateur won the 2012 National PAL Championship. Glazkov won a bronze medal at super heavyweight in the 2008 Olympics in Beijing. Those were the same Games in which Wilder won a bronze at heavyweight.
Szpilka, who admitted he once was a soccer hooligan in his native Poland, has been an entertaining fighter despite mostly competing in low-level bouts over his career. He did best Tomasz Adamek, which is a solid win even if Adamek was near the end of the line, and he went 10 rounds before being stopped by Bryant Jennings.
The card was built around Wilder and he’s the guy who has the most potential to actually become something. It’s disappointing that since winning the belt a year ago, he’s chosen to face very low-level opposition (defeating Eric Molina and Johann Duhaupas) in his two title defenses since beating Bermane Stiverne.
But Wilder has good tools and he’ll probably drill Szpilka and deliver a fun knockout.
Glazkov should win the other bout, but Martin could step up and prove he’s a legitimate contender.
We should expect better as boxing fans, but this is what has become of the sport. The good news here is that Showtime is airing the bouts as part of its free preview weekend, so it’s not costing anyone a thing. On top of that, it’s being streamed live on YouTube, so all it takes is an Internet connection to see it.
So my advice is this: Enjoy the fights, and hope for some action, and don’t get angry over the fact that so many undeserving fighters are parading around as either champions or championship contenders.
If you take it for what it is, you might enjoy it and not give yourself heartburn over the fact that these guys are fighting for the same belts that legends such as Joe Louis, Muhammad Ali, Lennox Lewis, Joe Frazier, Evander Holyfield and Mike Tyson once wore.
It’s either that or walk away forever. And despite as disgusting as things get in boxing at times, the former seems like a much better choice to me.
