By Anthony Mason: Far too often in today’s era of boxing do we hear that a certain fighter is a so-called “world champion” in multiple divisions. That is false 99% of the time. These boxers are simply belt holders in multiple divisions, not world champions. People claim that a fighter is great based on how many “world champions” he has beaten, when none of those opponents are world-class at all.
Floyd Mayweather Jr himself has said that a belt doesn’t define him. That also means that a belt doesn’t define a true world-class champion. Especially in today’s era, where belts are fabricated out of thin air for any journeyman to pick up. Even with major belts, there are four available in each weight class. Since today’s boxers are much less skilled than those of the older days, a lot of smoke and mirrors have been fabricated to hide the dearth of quality.
In the days of the greatest boxers, like Henry Armstrong, Ray Robinson, Willie Pep, Harry Greb, and more, there was only one belt in each division. That was it. If Sugar Ray Robinson wanted to be the champion, he wouldn’t be allowed to pick and choose between the Ring magazine title, the WBC title, WBA, WBO, etc. like the falsely self-proclaimed greatest fighter of all time does today.
To uneducated boxing fans of today’s watered down and overall weak era, Henry Armstrong’s status as a three-division champion wouldn’t seem impressive. Many would say that there are so many three-division champions today and be unimpressed. The fact that there are so many three-division champions is proof of the very low worth of belts and titles in this day and age. In Armstrong’s day, you couldn’t jump 5 pounds from 147 to 152 or 3 pounds from 147 to 150 and call yourself a multiple-division champion like Mayweather and Pacquiao did.
No, there were no junior/super weight classes back then making it not only harder to pick up belts and be a real world champion, but also much harder to climb weight and be a real multiple-division champion. When most of the greatest boxers were around, there were only eight belts available in eight weight classes. Now, there are 68+ belts available in 17 weight classes. No wonder we have all these fighters with so many fake title defenses, paper belts, and 5, 6, 7, or 8 division champions in today’s era of weaker boxers.
Armstrong won the championship at 126, moved to 135 and 147, and won the only belt available in each of those divisions as well. He then moved up to 160 where he was robbed of his fourth division title. Mayweather only jumped from 130 to 154, picked up trinket belts against past-prime (De La Hoya, Cotto, Mosley) or generally weak competition (Corrales, Gatti, Hatton, Castillo, Hernandez, Judah, Baldomir, etc.) for the most part, and somehow has the audacity to call himself a 5-division champion.
He said it himself; the belts don’t define him, so there is nothing false about what I said regarding the diminished value of his accomplishments. Combine that with Armstrong fighting almost 20 fights a year at his peak (as opposed to Mayweather’s 2.5 a year), and against actual world-class opposition like Ceferino Garcia, Barney Ross, Lou Ambers, and Petey Sarron and it’s impossible to even begin to understand the difference in quality. No wonder Mayweather is undefeated. He doesn’t even fight three times a year, and outside of Cotto and Marquez he hasn’t fought any legitimate opponents that were not completely washed up.
Look at someone like Joe Calzaghe. Calzaghe is lauded with undeserved praise for being in so many “championship” fights at 168. Calzaghe did not fight one legitimate opponent until his very last match at 168, when he beat Kessler. He beat one legitimate opponent at 168, but he is credited with having 20 other fraudulent title defenses. The illegitimacy of his title reign was exposed when Bernard Hopkins, the only elite and non-shot fighter Calzaghe ever fought, schooled him only for Calzaghe to undeservedly get the judges’ decision. Even Calzaghe’s father and trainer told his son that the fight was over and that Joe needed a stoppage heading into the final round. So much for Calzaghe being a legitimate champion at 175. If title defenses were the sole basis of greatness, then the likes of Dariusz Michalczewski, a good fighter nonetheless, would have to be placed as the second greatest of all time, since his number of consecutive title defenses are second only to Joe Louis.
Wladimir Klitschko and his brother have accumulated a lot of title defenses, but against whom? Not even ONE credible opponent. And somehow people had the audacity to call the likes of Walcott, Charles, Schmeling, and Conn, among many others, a Bum of the Month club. I wonder how badly those people would degrade the state of today’s heavyweight division if they were able to see the horrible regression of quality.
Manny Pacquiao is also falsely lauded with praise for being an eight-division champion. If he was an eight-division champion in Armstrong’s day, that would mean he beat the absolute best opponents to win every championship from flyweight all the way to heavyweight. He wouldn’t be fighting weak opponents like Sasakul, Ledwaba, Larios, and Diaz, and he wouldn’t be allowed to jump 3 pounds and claim that he won another “world title” in another weight division. Now Sam Langford, he actually jumped from lightweight (fighting all-time greats like Joe Gans) all the way up to heavyweight (against all-time greats like Johnson, McVey, and Wills). Mayweather and Pacquiao aren’t good enough to do that. Put those two in the ring with Joe Jeanette, Jack Johnson, Harry Wills, Sam McVey, and I wouldn’t want to even begin to think about what would happen.
Now, greats like Duran, Hagler, Hearns, and Leonard are given a lot of praise despite being in an era with more belts and weight classes. The difference is that those men fought the absolute best of the best available, and all of them in or near their primes. Their belts and number of weight classes climbed do not define them. The elite level of opposition they fought defines them. While Mayweather and Pacquiao are busy fighting competition like Canelo and shot Margarito under 154 lbs, Roberto Duran went all the way up to middleweight to defeat Iran Barkley. Marvin Hagler didn’t leave 160, but remind me when Mayweather and Pacquiao fought someone like Thomas Hearns, Ray Leonard, or Roberto Duran? Instead, they have Ricky Hatton to fight, a man whose greatest achievement is beating a solid but far from great Kosta Tzyu. Even the prime Mugabi is a much more credible win than the likes of a past-prime Cotto, De La Hoya or shot Margarito and Mosley. The same examples can be applied to Leonard and Hearns fighting Duran and Benitez.
There are very few boxers of the modern era, Roy Jones and Bernard Hopkins among others, that can consider themselves to be true champions in multiple weight divisions. It’s not the belts, defenses, or multiple division titles that make the fighter. It’s who you fought. Mayweather and Pacquiao fought pretty solid competition overall, and they are the best since the end of Hopkins’ middleweight reign, but that doesn’t say much given the weakness of this era. Mayweather himself stated that Arturo Gatti, the man from whom Mayweather won his only belt at 140, was a C-class boxer. Mayweather unknowingly proved how much of a farce his claim is to being a 5-division champion. He himself admitted that one of his belts came from a C-class fighter. What’s the value in being a 5-division “world champion” if it comes against C-level opposition? Mayweather himself said it. You can disagree with me all you want, but given what Mayweather said and what I have proven, there is no denying that belts and multiple division titles don’t mean much given the state of boxing today.
Unfortunately, boxing has become more of a business than a sport. It will be a long time before an era arrives where the best boxers consistently prove themselves as legitimate world-class champions. Instead, we have to be content with an era where the likes of Robert Guerrero, Brandon Rios, and Victor Ortiz are called champions. And with that, fans will be and are under the false impression that their favorite boxers are up against “world class opposition” when that is sadly the furthest thing from the truth.
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