Changes At The Top: Part 1 – The Need For An International Governing Body
July 8th, 2009
By Adam Laiolo: World football has FIFA, Formula One Motorsports has the FIA, Basketball has FIBA all providing the order and management of their sports. From grass roots to the top, the athletes in their respective fields know that they can look up and know they’re taken care of. Boxing has Jose Sulaiman of WBC and his other partners in crime i.e. Gilberto Mendoza of the WBA and their opposite numbers in other sanctioning bodies, the WBO, IBF and IBO etc.
To have a body or even a committee that can govern the body top to bottom would benefit everyone. The key is it has to be impartial which means no bias or favoritism. A little known fact is that this has been tried and tested before, with the IBU. Not to be confused with the current IBU of the same name, this was an attempt to bring clarity to a sport of broken factions.
The WBC was originally just that too, created by a host of nations designed to bring universal rules and regulations to boxing. The original IBU was 98 years ago. And since then the idea of a world recognized governing body was merely whispered and treated like a dirty thought.
Whisper loud enough and someone might hear you they say. If tomorrow, the respective sanctioning bodies were presented with an agenda, to have one omnipotent power they would veto it immediately. Why? Because that means they would lose control or an element their control over the boxing market.
To have one organization at the top would cause tremors in the offices of the alphabet bodies. The only way this could happen if there was a way they could co-exist, because another 25 years of ridiculous mandatory defenses, interim and super champions is not going to stimulate the sport in anyway, only stifle it.
Now I’m not for one second implying that the WBC or WBA does everything within their power to ruin our sport that would be unfair. But you get the sense that with all of them its money first, prestige second and then the health of the sport last. The term ‘champion’ is loosely thrown around these days and the real significance of the word is now lost. And that is all to do with these bodies, four world champions per division?
And how often do they ever all come together for a fight? Because the WBC or IBF don’t like the belt being in the hands of someone not to their liking, and will bend the rules accordingly (Chavez-Tszyu anyone?) This is what has to be cut out, the shysters and rats running our sport saying one thing but meaning another. They are like the politicians of our sport, bend the truth to aid themselves. To have someone over their head, watching their every move so their deals and schemes can be done in the light of day. I’m not totally against the idea of more than one champion in a division in an imperfect world, but four, is ridiculous.
This organization could be made up of people in the know and want to have the sport flourish. There could even be WBC, IBF, WBA and WBO representatives on this organization to give equality and fairness. The judges at fights would be appointed by the body impartially; ring doctors and referees too all employed or part of, an international ruling body. Sanctioning bodies appointing their own judge/s? Does that ever happen in any other sport?
New York Yankees appointing their specifically chosen umpire for the job? Manchester Utd having their own referee for a European Cup Final? Its nonsense, we need someone to clear all out the grey and paint it black or white. If the WBC want to try and bend their rules now, it would be easy. Sure they’d get some bad press, but ultimately they’d get away with it.
This has to change, we can’t have one rule for one and another for another, it’s got to be clear fair and managed. Transparency and clarity so everybody, even us fans lo-and-behold, would know where they stand and god forbid they ever put us fans first. They have to have someone to answer to, or this is going to go on for another however many years boxing can continue in this self-destruction mode.
We need this to happen and you can be sure the WBC & Co will do everything within themselves to make sure it never happens. It just a case of how to get the idea in motion, someone powerful and with a voice people listen has to stand up and make the sounds to let people know this is the direction we should go in. And it’ll take one hell of a brave person to do it.
10 Responses to “Changes At The Top: Part 1 – The Need For An International Governing Body”
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I can remember the good old 70′s & 80′s when we had only 2 champs. Then Larry Holmes accepted Bob Lee’s IBF heavyweight title. At first no one paid attention but he was the top heavyweight fighter. Suddenly they were 3 bodies. Other fringe bodies felt they could make a go at it but they died of lonelines and lack of attention.
Then in the 90′s Oscar fresh from being the only US gold medalist took the WBO Jr L-weight title. Everyone jumped to get on the Golden Bandwagon and
now there are four. The very journalists who now cry about multiple champs are the ones who first recognized these alphabet titles.
I respect the ring but they are the ones who gave recognition to the IBF and WBO after initially stating editorially that they would not. The best thing they did however was to set up their int’l panel to arrive at fair rankings, regardless of country. The WBA & WBC for years had reaked of political bias and seemed anti US.
But wait, when Bob Lee started the IBF he said his organization would be the most honest and not have any political affiliations. The road to heaven was built on great intentions, just go and check the origins of each different religion.
Each was split off from another one and now today look what we’ve got. 1,000 and each claiming they have the only path to heaven. After thousands of years they still can’t solve religion. How do you think greedy, self centred, self interested non visonary, shortsighted egotists can save boxing?
The idea of FIFA, FIBA and the ICC (cricket) was again good intentions. But form the get-go the original founders did not tryst each other. Then tey learnt to exist and share the power among themselves but as these sports started to expand, reluctantly they had to let in new members. When these sports became bigger and $ was being made, it was a bitter pill to swallow (read share $).
As usual, in everything that involves $, greed , politics and their siblings, always rear their ugly heads. Boxing is no different! Please do not mention MMA. They are no different than NBA, NFL & NHL. They are self contained leagues and not int’l organizations. They change the rules to suit the owners.
For Christ sakes, the NFL is strictly american. The NBA & NHL are always in conflict with the world bodies over players. At least in football FIFA does not allow national organziations to set their own rules. FIFA caters to what is in the best interest of England, Germany, Spain and the rich European leagues; they are not exactly pure!
First, there are way too many classes so lets’s get back to the original 8. However, due to the huge size disparity, we need criserweights. Then maybe add Super Heavy for guys over 225 or 230.
We have divisions separated by 3-6 lbs but expect guy at 201 to fight guys over 230? Marcino, Ali, Louis, Dempsey and Tyson would be giving up huge weight differences if they fought today.
Regarding multiple titles, it is difficult to get those organizations to disband so going forward their titles would only be referred to as regional titles. The only title fully recognized as a world title is the Ring’s that could only be lost in the ring.
A fighter must meet a designated mandatory each year. He can go outside of a mandatory but it must be vs guys in the top 5. Since he can’t face everyone in the top 10, there would be regular box-offs within the top 10 to determine who gets a mandatory. This way we get to see top guys fighting each other and the ultimate top guys getting the mandatory shot. If top ten guys do not fight each other, they move back down to avoid guys ducking people to protect their “0″. If a guy is injured and it is legit, he is given another chance withing reason, after a legit exam but not like Vitali. Many guys have lost titles due to bad luck, injuries or illness because they choose to fight. That is the same in a real world so put the gloves on and fight or work your way back up. The clock keeps ticking!
This may sound too good to be true but I think something like this might work. But I am sure the a-holes would not want it because it may make some sense and if they did, they definitely would find a way to mess it up.
Boxing is getting into a bit of a state these days theres no doubt about it. For the reasons you state and other reasons, which all boils down to MONEY.
My big worry is that all the governing bodies who allowed it to get out of hand in the 1st place are happy how it is.
It seems the WBC,WBO,WBA,IBF and who ever else is out there these days are not interested in having this sport being as competitive as possible anymore they just like the money they can squeeze out of it while at the same time they seem lazy and dont get too involved in fight negotiations, they just leave it to the promoters while they hold out their hand for some cash then do the same with the TV companies.
It would be nice to know that these governing bodies acknowledge its goin down hill but i dont think they believe that to be the case.
thanks for taking the time to read the article, seems most people want to hear about manuel perez and scott gilfoid cr*ppin out of their mouths
No one else seems to care, but I can see who really loves this sport. Thanks Steve M. and Nicky.
I agree it will take alot of work. But where is a lovely sport headed if we don’t do this. Are we going to just stand here and watch as boxing gets decapitated? We must do everything we can. Millions of fans and generations behind us will thank us for doing what we did. I say we compose a good letter and have a million signatures and send copies to all promoters, all bodies, and networks.
lol GBP reaks of con artistry than any of these bodies
Allow for Golden Boy Promotions to take over the sport of boxing and it will return to mainstream America.
So what do we do Steve M? What is going to be our immediate action?
any sport which can call a fight between a grandad and a circus freak ( Holyfield Valueev) a world title fight has real problems ,Iam not an MMA fan but look at the card for UFC 100 and you will understand why it is growing ,4 or 5 genuine best vs best fights and on one bloody card not 4 different ones . Change or continue to die .let this site pick up the baton and start a campign for change, real boxing fans should not settle for the crap that is regulalry served up now , eg why has Tarver got another shot , Why would Pavliks next fight not be abraham or williams etc etc etc
It’ll happen – one day. But I think it’ll take a Stanford or Abramovich type to enter the sport – someone with the want, passion and financial clout to unite boxing.