The v2 Boxing brain of the year 2014 - Fight 3 - Round 1

Please vote for your favourite response to the question at hand. The judging will be open until Friday and further rounds will be published as and when.

To avoid bias, the contenders are not revealed.

Will boxing ever be taken over by MMA in popularity?

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Contender 1

Boxing, an ancient sport and in its golden era, the most popular sport in the states, if not the world over. Heavyweights such as Jack Dempsey obliterated records and foes before unprecedented audiences. Decades later Joe Louis proved himself a focal point of racial unity due to his humble submission to the rules imposed on him by the all white powers of the time. Louis passed the torch to Marciano, within a decade of The Rock’s retirement a new star ignited. One which burned with such great intensity the world will never see another like him: The Greatest, Muhammad Ali.
While the heavyweight division awaited a heavyweight fit to fill Ali’s sizable shoes, four great smaller men clashed repeatedly and laid the foundations of the modern day superfight. As their stars waned, Tyson took over.

The capitulation of Tyson lead to his incarceration in 1994. One year earlier the first ever UFC show was held. 20 years on and the heavyweight kings have, one after the other, gone downhill in excitement, charisma, and many would argue, talent.
Smaller men such as De La Hoya and Mayweather attempted to replicate the achievements of the four kings, the fracturing of titles, the egos of promoters preventing a host of great fights made this a nearly impossible task.

Meanwhile, UFC provided regular, stacked cards. Losses didn’t deem fighters useless. The best fought the best. The near bare knuckle style of the violence was brutal, hardcore, and this “anything goes” style made it akin to a street fight, leading more people keen on learning self defense to take up MMA at grass roots level. The likes of Jon Jones achieved cross over status. UFC even has well known female combatants, something boxing has never truly managed.

Everything has gone in favour of MMA over the past decade. Yet more people tuned into Mayweather v Alvarez than tuned into Jones v Gustaffson and Velasquez v Dos Santos combined despite being the Mayweather card being more expensive. Mayweather v Alvarez: 2.2 million buys. Both UFC cards combined: 600-650k buys. Mayweather is a big personality, but rarely has exciting fights. Alvarez had a big following of Mexicans, but few outside that demographic were hugely aware of the unproven Mexican. Jon Jones is the UFC’s biggest name, and Velasquez an exciting latino heavyweight champion from the west coast fighting a rubber match. If MMA were going to overtake boxing it would be now, on the crest of a wave before the novelty wears off. It failed by a distance.

With this in mind, I’ve focused only on America where UFC is at it’s most popular. In the UK a boxing match between a divisional #2 and a previously little known upstart sold 80,000 tickets quicker than you can say arm bar. The most famous thing a UK MMA competitor has done is marry Jordan. In Germany dull boxing mis matches in weak divisions fill out huge venues.

MMA competes, but fails against boxing in the states, and requires only one Arum or Mayweather-esque figure to destroy the momentum it has gained. Worldwide boxing shows no signs of giving up its title of world’s most popular combat sport.
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Contender 2


The popularity of MMA, and more prominently UFC in recent years has resulted in a divide between boxing and MMA fans resulting in the age old argument, will MMA ever be more popular than boxing?

UFC certainly has strong pay per view numbers, only two shows in the last two years have had less than 150,000 viewers tune in, which is impressive considering they have a show every month, it has a history of seeing the best fight the best which has obviously drawn more fans in to the sport. Boxing on the other hand has gone the opposite way. Floyd Mayweather is constantly criticized for not facing the biggest challenges, and possibly the highest grossing fight in the history of the sport failed to materialize due to daft stipulations set out in the contract, another benefit of the UFC rather than the numerous promoters and managers that we see in boxing.

However, when have two UFC fighters ever sold 60,000 tickets in just over an hour? The answer? Never. George Groves and Carl Froch showed that, in this country at least boxing is still going strong, has a huge following and thanks to Sky Sports not overloading fans with pay per views, the casual fan is coming back to the sport. Compare this to North America where UFC has the cable TV deal, meaning their shows are free, while a boxing PPV costs around $79.99, it is clear why their numbers are consistently good.

In my opinion, MMA will never overtake boxing’s popularity. When older boxing fans talk to their kids, grandkids they can talk about history. They can point them to the Gatti vs Ward trilogy, The Rumble In The Jungle, the Ali era, MMA can’t do this, and I doubt it will ever be able to.
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Vote for your favourite above and don't forget to vote in previous rounds too -

Was the Rocky franchise good or bad for boxing? - https://www.606v2.com/t55525-the-v2-boxing-brain-of-the-year-2014-round-1-fight-1

The last great heavyweight was…….https://www.606v2.com/t55589-the-v2-boxing-brain-of-the-year-2014-fight-2-round-1

Oooh, knife edge....

I would have thought this might have sparked a bit of a debate! Poor choice of topic obviously!

I think it's got to do with the fact that both contestants agree. Tough to form an dialogue when you're just deciding who you're agreeing with more

Boxing fans aren't interested in watching guys in lycra shorts rolling on the ground sniffing each other's asses.

Strongback wrote:Boxing fans aren't interested in watching guys in lycra shorts rolling on the ground sniffing each other's asses.

You just won.