In the “interim”…
Published by Charles Jay on December 29th, 2008 in Operation Cleanup

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IN THE “INTERIM,” CAN WE DROP THE SAD IMITATION OF BOXING?

I remember when the World Boxing Association asked me to get involved as a member of the ratings committee, back in 2002. They were looking to regain a little credibility in the wake of a ratings scandal, and at the time I was compiling a lot of investigative stuff on boxing, including some stuff involving them, and so I was in a position, perhaps, to give them some credibility. I countered with an idea I had about putting together an extensive poll of media members, which could constitute their world ratings very easily. Well, they were open to it, though ultimately an agreement on how the poll would be structured couldn’t be reached.

One of the other things that held me back from participating with them, however, was the fact that they were not going to alter the way they designated their champions. In any normal organization, one would have the “world champion,” and that would pretty much be that. But with the WBA (and to be fair, I must say that other ratings bodies adopted this), if there were circumstances where the world champion could not defend the title when they wanted him to, for injury reasons or otherwise, they would designate another fight for an “interim title,” and that interim title would be filled, and indeed defended, until such time as the actual world champion would be able to step in there and fight, and presumably he would fight the interim champion. Then to go beyond that, if the world champion went on to “unify” the title, that is, to win a championship as recognized by another sanctioning body, that champion would be designated a “super champion.” You see, it was becoming increasingly difficult to extract multiple sanctioning fees from those kind of champions, and organizations usually just stripped a guy if he wouldn’t pay the fee.

But the WBA figured that they would hold on to that guy as a champion, while at the same time vacating the specific WBA title he held, so as to leave it open and charge yet another fee. Are you confused about all that? I confused just writing it. I don’t even know how to describe it.

Here is part of an open letter to Guy Jutras of the WBA’s Executive Committee addresses numerous concerns and turning down the opportunity to affiliate my poll with his organization:

“The concept of the “Super Champion”, “Unified Champion”, or whatever term ultimately is used, is very hard to get around, particularly for members of the media. While I understand the rationale behind it as you have explained it to me, I don’t think writers are too interested in explaining that rationale to their readers, because they don’t necessarily agree or identify with the idea of having a “Super Champion” AND “World Champion” in the same division, with the same sanctioning body. Indeed, instead of alleviating confusion, it actually CREATES more confusion. And they’re not too anxious to explain why they’re associated with that kind of thing, even if it is strictly in a tangential manner.”

I mean, in boxing it was bad enough that you could have four different world champions in one division as recognized by four major ratings organizations (WBC, WBA, WBO, IBF), not to mention umpteen smaller outfits (IBO, WBU, IBC, NBA, UBA, IBU, etc.). Now there was the dynamic being created where there could conceivably be three champions (super, regular and interim) in ONE division, recognized by ONE sanctioning body. I guess that’s what we call inflation.

By now, if you’re one of the sharper members of our audience (i.e., one who knows enough to use the term “stamina” rather than “cardio” when referring to a fighter’s staying power), you understand what that bit of background is doing in an MMA story. If you are the UFC, and you have touted yourselves as the operation that is doing it better than boxing does it; that you are avoiding the pitfalls that boxing didn’t; that you are more legitimate, etc., etc. etc. (and indeed, for the most part, you indeed do it like that), then DON’T advertise a Randy Couture-Brock Lesnar fight for the heavyweight championship, then come back a month later with an “interim” heavyweight title, then return again with THE fight that’s going to be for the “undisputed” heavyweight title. Where is the dispute? UNDISPUTED titles, as they have always been contested, are between different organizations that recognize different champions.

Here, the UFC has manufactured the “dispute” itself. This smacks of artificially milking part of your audience – the unsuspecting part – for one $44.95 fee after another, as if they don’t trust that the quality of the matches themselves could stand on their own. I would like to think that isn’t the kind of practice the UFC wants to perpetuate, but it does seem that any time a champion gets hurt, they’re ready to create another champion out of thin air, then bill something for an “undisputed” title after all is said and done.

That’s a cheap page torn right out of the boxing playbook. And it takes away some of the moral authority the UFC has managed to successfully use in positioning its product against the “sweet science,” which gets a little more sour when we have titleholders of the “paper only” variety. This is the kind of thing they professed to be avoiding, but they continually embrace it. If you say you’re better than that, then BE better than that.

I really hope they hear me, because you can only fool people for so long.