As late as the 1990s. boxing had its moments where it transcended the periphery of sports into the mainstream.
But think now to boxing’s last big megafight.
Keep thinking.
It was probably Tyson-Holyfield in 1996, and that one, like so many efforts at creating megafights the past two decades, was a few days late, a few dollars short, in terms of timing and delivery.
(That bite of an ear notwithstanding.)
The decline of Tyson coincided with the decline of the big-time fight that captured the mainstream sports public’s attention.
The 1970s and 1980s had so many megafights that you pretty much went from one to the next. The sport was chock full of one-name superstars – Ali, Frazier, Foreman, Leonard, Hearns, Hagler, Holmes.
Any number of dream matchups could materialize at any moment, and that was what made boxing culturally relevant.
Floyd Mayweather Jr. and Manny Pacquiao are the last two fighters that transcend the sport of boxing, and as such their megafight, seven years in the making, was inevitable.
Just an inevitable is what will happen after the final bell tonight.
This will be boxing’s last megafight.
There are no stars behind Mayweather and Pacquiao that can capture the mainstream sports public’s attention the way they do, the way Ali, Frazier et al did in the ‘70s and ‘80s, the way Rocky Marciano and Sugar Ray Robinson and Joe Louis and others did before them.
The two best heavyweights in the world, both surnamed Klitschko, will never match up in their own megafight for the ages, and outside of the oddity of seeing two brothers hit each other, there’s little public clamor for them to do so.
Outside of the Klitschkos, whatcha got? If you’re not a boxing diehard, odds are that you can name as many world champs off the top of your head as you can name top contenders in today’s Kentucky Derby off the top of your head.
And it’s only downhill from here, as we learn more about the impact of concussions on the long-term health of athletes, with boxing being defined by concussive impacts.
And then there’s how over the last decade, boxing has lost significant market share to UFC, which is itself now beginning a decline as its top stars are falling out of favor with the public, with issues with PED and drug use and criminal activity putting the best-laid plans of Dana White for his monthly main events into constant rewrites.
For 47 minutes tonight, and I fully expect Mayweather-Pacquaio to go the distance, so we won’t get cheated in that respect, boxing is the center of the sports world.
It will never be again.
– Column by Chris Graham
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