(Photo: Gene Blevins/Hogan Photos) By Gerardo Granados: Weight divisions were made to protect fighters so that there were even fights; also rankings were made to avoid dangerous mismatches. Or is it the result of the greedy promoters so that they can put on numerous championships title bouts? One pound can be too much of a difference, if it is to make the weight division limit or to allow your opponent to go heavier in to the fight.
A natural mini flyweight fighter would be in a rough night if he was scheduled to fight against natural super bantamweight, but could it be possible for a lightweight to engage against a welterweight? The main goal of organized boxing is to protect the fighters and the rules have changed from the beginning until now, but those rules changed to protect and benefit boxers.
A friend of mine believes that it is not fair and that boxing commissions and boxing organizations should not allow fighters who are separated by a 14 pounds weight gap from their natural fighting weight divisions to fight each other; he said that it is not fair for a lightweight to fight a welterweight or a welter to engage a middleweight because of their size, and even less to let a mini flyweight fight a super bantamweight, there are 6 weight divisions in between and 14 pounds. If it was a lightweight vs. a welterweight it would be only 3 weight division and 12 pounds gap.
Organized boxing priority is to protect the fighters, as the reader already knows some measures taken were that professional fighters were ranked, the championship bouts went from 15 rounds to only 12, weight in one day previous the fight, one month weigh inn, protecting standing eight count, performing enhancing drugs test, just to mention a few.
Now a day you get to see less effective knockouts and get to see more technical knockouts and on times we get to see how the referee prematurely stops the fight when he thinks a fighter is hurt and stops the fight to protect him from any further damage. Will someone be held liable if a permanent injury or death occurs due the result of a professional boxing match? Not even the boxing fans thirst of blood can be blamed. The brave mean sons of boxing don’t care to give 14 pounds advantage and that is one of the reasons why pro boxing still is the best contact sport but that is the same reason why organized boxing better protect them.
Maybe the referee will step in to protect Josesito if he is hurt, but I wonder if the referee will do the same for Canelo or will the referee give him time to recover. The Jose Miguel Cotto vs. Saul Alvarez first round proved that Canelo can be hurt early, so let´s not write off Josesito Lopez just yet.
Is it fair to allow a 14 pounds weight gap? Well, that depends on the personal point of view of the reader, I believe it is fair but not even, but if the boxing skills are too uneven then the fighters should not be allowed to engage. What does the reader think?
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