WBA Declines To Sanction Klitschko-Chagaev

[Dave Rado]

this fight also will bring us one step closer to eliminating these corrupt boxing orgs.

(Unfortunately)

[Bigdaddy_Vh]

the wba is not sanctioning this fight b/c they know if chagaev loses, he will want to hold on to the belt and will charge him a bs sanctioning fee. if klits were to win it, he would vacate the title before making a BS mandatory.

[Johnny Rebel]

The orgs. may never be eliminated completely but the majority of true boxing fans know that most alphabet champions are bogus. Having an alphabet title is much less prestigious then it was 20-30 years ago. Unless they are forced to clean their orgs up, they will become irrelevant to most. The top fighters will just throw away the belts and the fans will know who the real champion is, this process has already begun.

[El_Cholo]

is the Ring Belt 100% up for grabs tomorrow?

[Dave Rado]

I would also like to add the IBO belt to that list.. since their Rankings are based on a computer.. They do NOT instantly rank "their" champs at Number 1.. and they rank other Bodies champs..

IBO

Have you seen who their champions are? Bika at Super-Middleweight, Mundine at Middleweight, Marali at Super-Featherweight - that's just crazy. And IMO we don't need yet another alphabet organisation, there are too many already. We need some to be forced out of business and the rest to be reformed. In the meantime, The Ring's champions and rankings are the best regarded in the sport, especially the champions, because nearly all are based on the lineal title (which the IBO champions are not).

Also, there is a place for mandatories (which neither the Ring nor the IBO have). What happens when there are no mandatories is that you get Archie Moore getting his first title shot at the age of 39, despite having been a contender for most of the previous 16 years. That's why they're a necessary evil. But there needs to be fewer sanctioning organisations, and they need to be made less evil. Not sure how that can be achieved though, but IMO adding yet another alphabet organisation to the mix won't help at all.

[lennon]

The article says the vacant lineal heavyweight championship is on the line, its not! Ring may be putting their belt up but thats not the same as the lineal.
They would have to beat Vitali to have a claim on that. Further complication is Valuev! But Vitali holds the strongest claim to lineal of them all at present.

[Dave Rado]

The orgs. may never be eliminated completely but the majority of true boxing fans know that most alphabet champions are bogus. Having an alphabet title is much less prestigious then it was 20-30 years ago. Unless they are forced to clean their orgs up, they will become irrelevant to most. The top fighters will just throw away the belts and the fans will know who the real champion is, this process has already begun.

Holmes threw away his belt, so did Bowe, so did Hamed, but nothing has changed, because fighters can only afford to do that once they are very big names. They still need the alphabet organisations in order to become such big names, which is why Khan is fighting Kotelnik, why Pacquiao fought Diaz, and why Cotto fought Jennings. And the mandatory system, although seriously flawed due to the corrupt rankings, is necessary - see my previous post. Without it, a lot of good fighters would never have got a shot.

[Dave Rado]

is the Ring Belt 100% up for grabs tomorrow?

Yes........

[Owlzfan84]

Have you seen who their champions are? Bika at Super-Middleweight, Mundine at Middleweight, Marali at Super-Featherweight - that's just crazy. And IMO we don't need yet another alphabet organisation, there are too many already. We need some to be forced out of business and the rest to be reformed. In the meantime, The Ring's champions and rankings are the best regarded in the sport, especially the champions, because nearly all are based on the lineal title (which the IBO champions are not).

Also, there is a place for mandatories (which neither the Ring nor the IBO have). What happens when there are no mandatories is that you get Archie Moore getting his first title shot at the age of 39, despite having been a contender for most of the previous 16 years. That's why they're a necessary evil. But there needs to be fewer of them, and they need to be made less evil. Not sure how that can be achieved though, but IMO adding yet another alphabet organisation to the mix won't help at all.

In the IBO's defense they also have Wladmir Klitschko, Chad Dawson, Manny Pacquiao, and before he tried to move up in weight they had Juan Manual Marquez at lightweight. Also their rankings are very good. They just need to start sanctioning more. The IBO is hit or miss with their champions, but i do like how they rank, and like i said their rankings are very good and pretty spot on.

[Dave Rado]

The article says the vacant lineal heavyweight championship is on the line, its not! Ring may be putting their belt up but thats not the same as the lineal.
They would have to beat Vitali to have a claim on that. Further complication is Valuev! But Vitali holds the strongest claim to lineal of them all at present.

That's a matter of opinion. Most boxing experts accept that when a lineal title is vacant it can be won either by the #1 and #2 contenders facing each other, or in really exceptional circumstances, by the #1 and #3 contenders facing each other. Most, but not all, agree with The Ring that this is just such an exceptional circumstance, because the #1 and #2 are brothers who, quite rightly, will never face each other. Most, but not all, agree with The Ring that Wlad is rightly rated #1 and Chagaev is rightly rated #3. So in the opinion of most, but not all, boxing experts, the winner on Saturday will be the new lineal champion. But you're entitled to disagree with them. Personally I agree with them that although it's not ideal, Wlad should be regarded as the lineal champ if he beats Chagaev.

As for Valuev, as far as I'm concerned he ducked out of the rematch with Chagaev. Apart from the fact that Chagaev had extremely low and completely non-infectious levels of hepatitis antigen left over from an illness a couple of years ago, Valuev was told the fight could go ahead if he had a vaccination, and he refused to have one. That, in my book, is a clear duck.