There’s No Logical Explanation of How Boxers Are Matched

You are expecting boxing results over the weekend and you find, to start with, that a gentleman named Magne Havnaa of Norway has retained his WBO cruiserweight title.

“I don’t mean to be personal,” you want to ask Mr. Havnaa, “but what is a cruiserweight? And if you hold the title of the WBO, what are the postures of the WBC, WBA and IBF?”

Next, you find that Michael Carbajal of Phoenix has retained the IBF light-flyweight title.

A light-flyweight is not to be confused with a heavy-flyweight.

OK, Julio Cesar Chavez of Mexico is next. He retains the junior-welterweight title of the WBA and IBF, but not of the WBC and the WBO.

In the wake of the foregoing, Mike Tyson knocks out Alex Stewart in the first round and inquires why he isn’t fighting Evander Holyfield for the heavyweight title, instead of Holyfield’s fighting George Foreman?

Is Tyson some kind of communist? And why would he pose a question that logical? Boxing isn’t founded on logic. If logic dictated the thinking of those connected with it, they wouldn’t have gone into boxing in the first place.

Historically, titleholders in boxing don’t defend their championships against logical opponents. If they did, would Tyson have fought Buster Douglas? That fight was so logical that Tyson entered a 43-1 favorite. It is such a preposterous matchup that Tyson forgets to get into shape. Knocked senseless by Buster, who is knocked senseless by Holyfield, Tyson demands to know today why Holyfield isn’t fighting him.

The answer is, Holyfield is fighting Foreman, instead of Tyson, for the same reason Tyson fought Douglas, instead of Holyfield.

Governments change. Societies change. Attitudes change. But boxing doesn’t change, proceeding today with the same roguery it did at the turn of the century.

As a fragment of what goes on, Tyson works with Don King, who not only is involved in the affairs of Tyson but also promotes his fights.

Can you think of a circumstance more outrageous than a promoter’s aligning himself with one of the principals? What would people say if the baseball commissioner, who runs the World Series, aligned himself with the Cincinnati Reds?

In the case of Tyson, he didn’t get a title fight with Holyfield, mainly because Holyfield doesn’t care for Don King.

So how does King respond? Unblinkingly, he charges racism, claiming that he and Tyson have been discriminated against . . . that Holyfield has fallen into the hands of white promoters.

Of course, Holyfield selected the promoters, not because they were white but because anyone represented an improvement over King.

To Foreman, who is 43, the promoter is incidental. George is pulling the world’s leg, talking up a fight in which he is selling a personality, not qualifications.

George will sell it, too. As a contest, it will be a farce, And, dutifully fleeced, the boxing public will return for the next farce.

You would have to say, though, that if it happens, through circumstances wholly flukish, that Holyfield meets Tyson, you would have something unique in boxing, namely, two guys in the same ring who belong there.

Tyson appeared well-conditioned for his one-round knockout of Alex Stewart last Saturday. Stewart looked intimidated. You couldn’t find a fighter who seemed more uncomfortable before a match than poor Alex.

Nor, certainly, was his confidence bolstered by HBO commercials advising viewers, “Pray for Alex Stewart.” If Alex needed prayers and Mike didn’t, why was this match made?

When Holyfield meets Foreman, on pay-TV, you feel a need for pre-fight messages that suggest: “Pray for the guy paying 40 bucks for this fiasco.”

At some time next year, it is logical that Tyson and Holyfield get together, but it’s surprising, within the lifetime of many in boxing, that something logical ever happens.