Let's take a minute and appreciate all the good things in boxing
We often focus on the bad but there's much to love about our sport
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Gather ‘round, Fight Freaks. No need to get off my lawn today. I’m in a good mood and want to celebrate the good things in boxing.
Negativity abounds around the sport. Spend 30 seconds on social media and it will come at you like a tidal wave: Negativity about mismatches; about obvious big fights worth millions that go unmade (yeah, I’m looking at you Errol Spence and Terence Crawford); about sanctioning bodies; fighter inactivity; the sorry state of overall drug testing; overpriced and underwhelming pay-per-views; naked greed; who’s on which side of the street. I could go on.
Vitriol is also directed toward fighters, promoters, broadcasters, referees and judges and, yes, media members. I know all about that last one because I have plenty of battle scars as I begin my 23rd year of covering the sport full time this month.
I have written and opined on all of the bad stuff time and again — and it has been deserved. But I think sometimes we forget about all the things that make boxing so great.
There is a reason we all follow it, talk about it, think about, read about and, in my case anyway, write about it.
Does the sport have problems? Absolutely. But there is still a lot to love even if we sometimes let all the bullshit take center stage more often than it should. We should never forget why we love it and the positive things about it.
So, let’s set aside the bad stuff for now. Let’s celebrate the good. Here are just some things that come to mind:
The euphoria felt when a highly anticipated fight is finally made. I had that feeling when the Gervonta Davis-Ryan Garcia and Stephen Fulton-Naoya Inoue fights were recently finalized. I’ve had the chance to cover numerous mega fights, which means that despite all the fights that did fall by the wayside there have still been plenty of huge ones. OK, I’m still pissed off we never got Roy Jones-Dariusz Michalczewski (look it up, youngsters), Erik Morales-Juan Manuel Marquez, Vasiliy Lomachenko-Mikey Garcia, Nonito Donaire-Abner Mares, Juan Manuel Lopez-Yuriorkis Gamboa (probably still marinating?), Kelly Pavlik-Arthur Abraham and Anthony Joshua-Deontay Wilder (when they were undefeated champions for the undisputed title), among others. But I still remember the genuine excitement I felt when deals were finally done for Floyd Mayweather-Manny Pacquiao, Canelo Alvarez-Gennadiy Golovkin I, Pacquiao-Miguel Cotto, Oscar De La Hoya-Mayweather, Joshua-Wladimir Klitschko, among many, many others.
How about when a fight that looked like a dog on paper turns out to be great? There are plenty of examples but the one that always comes to mind for me was 10 years ago this month: Timothy Bradley Jr.-Ruslan Provodnikov. On paper? Meh. And then the bell rang and they produced the 2013 fight of the year, one of the best fights of the decade, and an all-time classic. Just last month we saw Emanuel Navarrete face replacement opponent Liam Wilson for the vacant WBO junior lightweight title. There were absolutely zero expectations for it to be anything memorable, especially when viewed in the context of Navarrete having been scheduled to fight Oscar Valdez in a can’t-miss fight until he withdrew due to injury. The obscure Wilson and Navarrete instead produced a bona fide fight of the year candidate.
