I keep losing gimme a title fight!

This sports a funny sport. One day you could have lost 7 of your last 9, you could have lost 4 world title fights in those 7 losses, you could be 35 as well, and yet tomorrow you could have made it 7 losses in 10 and be the world champion. Don't ask me how Jose Antonio Aguirre managed to get his recent WBC Light Flyweight title fight and we, as boxing fans need to feel a little bit relieved he's not going to wake up tomorrow as the champion but what were the WBC thinking?

Aguirre,who fell to 35-10-1 challenged Gilberto Keb Baas, now 35-20-4 for the title. Aguirre had some how been ranked #8 by the WBC in a weight class he hadn't made since May 2007 and hadn't scored a win in since August 2006. Not only had he gone 2-7 entering the bout but he'd been fighting at a higher weight class, his wins had come fighters with terrible records (4-5-1 and 8-16-3) and he'd fought only once in 2 years.

Although Keb Baas has a much worse record his recent form has genuinely been half decent. His previous 9 fights had been 6-1-2 including a brilliant win over Omar Nino Romero for the title. Most of his career losses were to decent fighters, guys like Pongsaklek Wonjongkam, Victor Zaleta and Omar Salado and he was in the form of his life, he was active, he was tick all the right boxes as a fighter. Don't get me wrong, he's nothing more than a title holder waiting for a challenger to come along and take his belt away, but he's an active fighter over the past few years on a run. Aguirre is an inactive fighter, who has been on the receiving end of a lot of recent beatings and should NEVER have been world ranked. Only the WBC ranked Aguirre which says it all.

Aguirre had, once, almost a life time ago (2000-2004) been the WBC's Minimumweight champion, maybe this is what helped lift him to such an over-inflated ranking, though it's stupid if it was and would allow fighter 5 years deposed to challenger for titles a division up. What may be the worst problem though is that this is the 3^rd attempt at the same title that Aguirre has had since 2005. His first attempt was a loss to Eric Ortiz (TKO7), his second was a 12 round decision to Brian Viloria. He would also challenge Roberto Vasquez (WBA champion) and Ulises Solis (IBF champion) for the title during his 2-7 run.

Imagine if tomorrow, Monte Barrett stood at #8 in any of the heavyweight rankings and the slaughtering a fighter would get for facing him. Oddly Barrett would, on paper, not me a much worse challenger. Barrett is 4 years older (39 to Aguirre's 35), with 1 draw more on his record (34-9-2 to Aguirre's 34-9-1) but 3-4-2 in his last 9. This really is the scandalous world of boxing rankings folks. A real joke.

Oh and just to test a theory. Manny Pacquiao.

Bloody fake records

Boxing fans often complain about “padded records” in boxing, where a fighter fights no one to create an artificially deep looking record. Although the term is often unfairly used against fighters who fight average opponents when they, themselves, are supposed to be world class it's more annoying when young you find fighters with around 20 fights who has never faced any sort of a test at all. I've been ultra critical of Deontay Wilder, a fighter who some Americans are cheering on as their future heavyweight champion and saviour. Wilder is a major case of a fighter with a padded and “perfect” record but he's far from the worst offender. In fact with out trailing through boxrec.com with a fine comb it's impossible to be sure who actually does have the most padded record.

One man that does need to be mentioned as a probably contender though is the 18-0 (17) Dzmitry Lubachkin from Belarus. You maybe asking what makes Lubachkin's record so padded? Well just take a look here:
He has faced 13 debutants
He has never faced a fighter who was better than 1-1-1 (his 14^th opponents-Aliaksandr Kuryanovich)
His opponents have a combined 1 win amongst them
The combined record of his 18 opponents have a record of 1-6-2

I've also complained a little about the likes of Nenad Borovcanin who also has a very padded record (27-0 with 19KO's) but even his is record isn't this poor.

The problem isn't that fans are asking too much of fighters, but that Lubachkin's record will be seen seriously by those outside of the sports actual fans. If Lubachkin was to meet a half decent fighter he'd be on paper an “impressive” opponent, though everyone would expect him to be badly beaten by any sort of semi-decent professional fighter. It's not fair on the fans and it's not fair on the guys he fights.

The WBA, oh the loveable WBA and their bizarre decisions

The WBA have again gone and done it, they've made even the most knowledgeable of boxing fans scratch their heads wondering what happened. British fighter Amir Khan has been made “The Super Lightweight Super champion”. The reasons for this are business, the WBA are wanting their title to be fought for between Marcos Maidana and Erik Morales. That fight has all the ingredients of a short lived but very exciting war as an ageing veteran faces off against a powerful punching but limited prime opponent. Though the fight it really not one I can agree with that's a completely different matter. What I want to look at is the WBA title policy. No not the one in the rule book (sorry but I can't be bothered to read 72 pages of “rules” that can be found on here http://www.wbaonline.com/) but the one that appears to be made up as they go along.

The WBA has no less than 29 fighters walking around claiming to be “world champion” (be it “super”, “regular”, “interim”). They have 3 Middleweight “world champions” and now have a vacant world title at Super Lightweight (thanks to Kahn's title being upgraded). The “super” title rule was generally thought to have been brought in to allow unified champions some leeway in facing mandatory WBA challengers, though now appears to be nothing more than another way for the organisations to collection sanctioning fees. Current “Super” champions include not only Khan but Juan Manuel Marquez (Lightweight), Chris John (Featherweight) Miguel Cotto (Super Welterweight), Felix Sturm (Middleweight)and Andre Ward (Super Middleweight) with some boxing fans (who have read the WBA's rules) also calling Yuriorkis Gamboa a Super champion.

From the WBA's website:

WBA SUPER CHAMPIONSHIPS

(by WBA - Feb 11, 2009 - 11:12:37 AM)

DEFINITION

The SUPER WORLD CHAMPION CATEGORY OR UNDISPUTED WORLD CHAMPION was created for those World Champions who hold the title of two or more organizations recognized by the WBA, like the World Boxing Council (WBC), the International Boxing Federation (IBF) and the World Boxing Organization (WBO).

Gamboa currently holds the WBA's belt and the IBF's belt at Featherweight though on the website is classed as a “Unified” champion and not “Super” whilst John is the WBA's “Super” champion.


We all know boxing awarding bodies like to make things up as they go along but the WBA's proliferation of “World” titles is beyond a joke. It's due to the WBA's title policy, joke rankings and bizarre mandatory defences that have left me creating my own championship, the Scott Graveson is Awesome title. I have declared myself the Super Duper Awesome Champion for eternity at everything ever...can't be much more of a joke than the WBA's world title.