Rich Davie
10-11-2011, 12:50 AM
http://www.examiner.com/images/blog/wysiwyg/image/everlast-boxing-gloves.jpg
As UFC continues its rise in the sports’ world, the future for boxing is up in the air
By JOSHUA NATOLI
Staff Writer
PUBLISHED October 11, 2011
As the stars were circling around Victor Ortiz’s head after a knockout by Floyd Mayweather Jr. I wondered to myself if this was good as boxing was going to get. In the past 5 years, boxing has taken a very seriously popularity and economic dive. This dive has led to various attempts to bring some life back into boxing such as free fights on HBO.
Even though the top Pay-Per-View event in history was a boxing match between Oscar De La Hoya and Floyd Mayweather, the WWE and UFC still sits much higher than boxing in respect to revenue and popularity.
Much of this major dip in popularity can to be attributed to the rise of the UFC and that is rightfully so. It seems as though out of nowhere the UFC became a household name. Everyone have heard of it before and thought of it as barbaric and only for a true martial arts fan. Once Spike TV started to air past matches on its network, people began to realize that the fights were extremely entertaining.
It offered everything boxing did not have at the time; shorts bouts, better fighting, and better fighters. The UFC offers much more action than boxing does as well. By incorporating multiple fighting styles, more vicious combat and more interesting fighters, the UFC’s popularity has grown so far past that of boxing.
The biggest popularity boost the UFC received was the acquisition of former WWE wrestling star Brock Lesnar. Lesnar brought many fans of the WWE into the world in UFC and brought the UFC to even greater heights. Aside from Lesnar, the UFC features some of the most exciting and greatest fighters in the world such as Georges St. Pierre, Anderson Silva, and Jon Jones. It seems rather savage but people love the knockouts and tapouts.
Boxing matches can and very often do go all twelve rounds without any action whatsoever, wasting a boxing fan’s time and money. The UFC can pretty much guarantee a knockout every event. The fights in the UFC are also a lot faster paced and quicker than boxing, allowing for more fights on the card in a given night.
Another drawback boxing has nowadays is the lack of popular fighters. I highly doubt any reader could tell me about Victor Ortiz prior to the Floyd Mayweather fight. Boxing is long past the glory days when everyone and I mean everyone knew the fighters. Guys like Muhammad Ali, Joe Frazier, George Foreman, and Mike Tyson do not exist in the boxing world anymore.
We still have Floyd Mayweather and Manny Pacquiao, but those guys won’t last much longer with Mayweather inching closer to retirement and Pacquiao now concentrating on his congressional duties in his native Philippines. When these two are gone, who will carry the torch?
Wladimir Klitschko? Please, the only fight credibility that he has done was being in the boxing scene in Ocean’s Eleven. Bernard Hopkins? He’s old enough to be my father let alone be the one to keep boxing alive. Maybe Clifford Etienne can start some sort of new wave of boxing while he serves his two life sentences in prison. If Mayweather and Pacquiao don’t give all us fight fans the match of the century that we want to see, then they very well may be looking for a new career instead of their next fight.
http://strosechronicle.com/wordpress/?p=1091
As UFC continues its rise in the sports’ world, the future for boxing is up in the air
By JOSHUA NATOLI
Staff Writer
PUBLISHED October 11, 2011
As the stars were circling around Victor Ortiz’s head after a knockout by Floyd Mayweather Jr. I wondered to myself if this was good as boxing was going to get. In the past 5 years, boxing has taken a very seriously popularity and economic dive. This dive has led to various attempts to bring some life back into boxing such as free fights on HBO.
Even though the top Pay-Per-View event in history was a boxing match between Oscar De La Hoya and Floyd Mayweather, the WWE and UFC still sits much higher than boxing in respect to revenue and popularity.
Much of this major dip in popularity can to be attributed to the rise of the UFC and that is rightfully so. It seems as though out of nowhere the UFC became a household name. Everyone have heard of it before and thought of it as barbaric and only for a true martial arts fan. Once Spike TV started to air past matches on its network, people began to realize that the fights were extremely entertaining.
It offered everything boxing did not have at the time; shorts bouts, better fighting, and better fighters. The UFC offers much more action than boxing does as well. By incorporating multiple fighting styles, more vicious combat and more interesting fighters, the UFC’s popularity has grown so far past that of boxing.
The biggest popularity boost the UFC received was the acquisition of former WWE wrestling star Brock Lesnar. Lesnar brought many fans of the WWE into the world in UFC and brought the UFC to even greater heights. Aside from Lesnar, the UFC features some of the most exciting and greatest fighters in the world such as Georges St. Pierre, Anderson Silva, and Jon Jones. It seems rather savage but people love the knockouts and tapouts.
Boxing matches can and very often do go all twelve rounds without any action whatsoever, wasting a boxing fan’s time and money. The UFC can pretty much guarantee a knockout every event. The fights in the UFC are also a lot faster paced and quicker than boxing, allowing for more fights on the card in a given night.
Another drawback boxing has nowadays is the lack of popular fighters. I highly doubt any reader could tell me about Victor Ortiz prior to the Floyd Mayweather fight. Boxing is long past the glory days when everyone and I mean everyone knew the fighters. Guys like Muhammad Ali, Joe Frazier, George Foreman, and Mike Tyson do not exist in the boxing world anymore.
We still have Floyd Mayweather and Manny Pacquiao, but those guys won’t last much longer with Mayweather inching closer to retirement and Pacquiao now concentrating on his congressional duties in his native Philippines. When these two are gone, who will carry the torch?
Wladimir Klitschko? Please, the only fight credibility that he has done was being in the boxing scene in Ocean’s Eleven. Bernard Hopkins? He’s old enough to be my father let alone be the one to keep boxing alive. Maybe Clifford Etienne can start some sort of new wave of boxing while he serves his two life sentences in prison. If Mayweather and Pacquiao don’t give all us fight fans the match of the century that we want to see, then they very well may be looking for a new career instead of their next fight.
http://strosechronicle.com/wordpress/?p=1091