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RANT: Can we talk about the fights, not the business of boxing?

The business of boxing is boring and depressing. 

I tune into boxing weekly, to see fights, I get the storyline aspects of the sport, but it feels that nowadays most content I read about boxing is speculation around rumors, none of which have been confirmed to be fact, but are just widely accepted assumption given by more than likely a high-ranking employee who informed a reporter. Essentially, instead of getting sports reporting, I am more or less, reading stuff from the business section of a periodical paper, only from people without business degrees (for the most part), speculating on where the business of boxing will go, because promoters will essentially give them strong hints that they’re going that way.

I am not mad at this, but am I the only one who finds this boring. I enjoy the act of boxing, the match-ups, good or bad, and want some takes, thoughts and all of that stuff.

Take the “Canelo situation”. I will give you a short version of it. Canelo sent out a tweet, people speculated that he is unhappy with his promoter, and then every scenario known to man comes out.

Canelo is the biggest draw in the sport, and the biggest headlines come from stories around him, but until he clearly states something publicly in detail or Golden Boy Promotions put something out everything lives in the world of speculation. Even sources in these situations have agendas more than likely in regards to the business side of things to accomplish a task at hand, make more money. So in short, we can make editorials trying to connect the dots, but we can also, simply sit and wait, as it unfolds and try to get the story right.

Golden Boy benefited from Canelo going to DAZN, and Canelo honestly is in a situation in which he will have to fight hard fight after hard fight with lingering injuries and a ton of money in the bank. These are facts.

That being said, none of this is all that interesting if you’re a fan of boxing, or at least not to me. This is the type of headache people get paid to deal with and the fact that is entertainment for the boxing community over the hometown debut of Vergil Ortiz on a solid card this weekend or the redemption story of Jason Sosa, shows that boxing is now becoming the backseat to the narrative arches outside the ring. I am all for storytelling, but at least make it about a fight as opposed to the Conor McGregor antics in which 85% of the stuff has little to do with a fight itself.

I probably sound like an old man complaining and I suppose I am, but it is tiresome when we look to get fight breakdowns, analytics, thoughts on tactical scenarios for fights rather, no matter if it is a mismatch. Instead, the Canelo drama and where Andy Ruiz Jr. versus Anthony Joshua will take place? Call me old fashion, but that is the job of the promoter, they promote these events, make packages that get people excited, and then the fight action, the comments, the backstory, the amateurs all of that builds up into one thing for someone to digest in roughly ten minutes at most in a written article to excite a hard working person to enjoy a fight.

I am basically saying I am bored. I love boxing, but outside of a few pieces here and there, rarely do I see things that talk about boxing and even worse, I am not even sure people writing about boxing, love it. It is just a form of their identity of who they are now.

I might be getting all over the place, but I quite simply wanted to write down my frustration with the lack of respect paid towards hardworking boxers who deserve media attention but are being ignored for fighters who are simply in boring situations that we will publicly know what happens with them shortly.

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Lukie Ketelle

Lukie Ketelle