Olympic boxing on

There are no knockdowns because guys won't commit. There's no point. Leap in, Leap out. Progress!! Order!!! Onwards!!!

 

My type of discussion! :bears:

I tend to agree that if you're allowing Kobe and Lebron to be at the Olympics, W. Klit and Vitali should be there to represent the Ukraine. It's only fair.

But.... I don't think that kobe and Lebron should be there. I don't think Football (soccer) should be there at all or tennis. I mean what next? GOLF? Formula one?

Certain sports shouldn't even be there, becaus ethey have major championships that are more meaningful than Olympc Gold medals. It kinda takes away from the sports where the Olympic gold is the pinnacle of their achievements (like Track, swimming, gymnastics, rowing etc).

I mean you ask ANY tenns player if they had to choose between winning Wimbledon or winning the Olympic old medal....they would all say Wimbledon. All basketball players would say the NBA championship.

Therefore this should disqualify those sports from the Olympic Games, IMO.

 

Very good points. I agree completely that football should be excluded from the games: Olympics shouldn't be a place for junior tournaments but for the best

I can accept tennis and basketball, since now the best athletes can compete and they also want to win it, but I can see your argument.

Then again a question can be risen about weight classes in Olympic boxing: should they be allowed to hand out twelve gold medals since in most other events there are no weight classes, even though size is essential in them. It is not quite as bad as swimming though (which is beyond ridiculous)

 

I had similar thoughts, that for starters elite pro boxers probably wouldn't WANT to compete, less money, different rules, far less reward from the same work put into pro boxing.

But yeah, if they want to, they should be allowed to.

I was wondering if you knew what the official reason is given by the Olympics on why pro boxers can't compete?

Considering the Olympics are supposedly (and generally are) the world's elite, I think Olympic boxing should really morph into an elite professional tournament. Pro boxers, pro rules. Then it really would be a big tournament of the world's elite fighters. Of course the only question then would be monetisation, to give a big enough incentive to pro fighters already earning millions.

 

In the case of boxing...

Olympics should stay amateur. The tradition of boxing is that the Olmpics are usually used as a springboard to a lucrative pro career. Let it stay that way. Keep the tradition. i do see teh points though.

Tennis and football, however, should stay the fuck out of the Olympics.

 

Yep - @ Middleweight Terrell Gausha (USA) technically stopped Andranik Hakobyan (Armenia) in the 3rd round with 0:00 left... ref stopped the fight.

Stoppage may have been your usual cautious amateur stoppage, but there were two knockdowns in the 3rd round. Nice looping right hand from Gausha dropped him the first time, then a lovely double left hook combo to put him down a second time.

 

There's a free bbc app on the iphone for schedules etc.

 

I believe the reason is not Olympic committee but the boxing union. They hold on to the tradition which makes no sense anymore in this world. I haven't heard any actual arguments for excluding pros

 

As someone said, the pro game and amatuer game are totally different. I can't think of any pro that would fight for three rounds.

It took the Super Six tournament two and a half years to finish. There's no way there could be a pro style tournament.

 

It's not just boxers either - Ken Norton's son, the former professional NFL Linebacker for the 49ers wanted to compete one year and they wouldn't allow it on the basis of him being a professional athlete, of any sport, period.

Thought that was interesting

 

Pros absolutely should not be allowed to participate in the Olympics.

 

Why not? It's supposed to be the best of the best, the world's elite.

 

I like the idea of amateur competition at the highest level.

 

I don't really.

I get Sly's point about tradition, sure, but overall I just feel the best should mean the best.

What fun would it be if the best runners and tennis players in the olympics were some comparatively scrubby amateurs, that would get absolutely thrashed by the likes of Bolt and Federer? How compelling would that be? To me, not very.

I would love it to become a kind of hybrid. Pro rules with pro boxers allowed, but not pro organisation, the tournament would be held in the same fashion, by the olympics in the olympics. You'd have pro judging, but only 4 three minute rounds, because of the amount of times they have to fight obviously, so as not to get burned out.

It could lead to some intense, high octane action, between what could and should be the very best boxers in the world.

 

The problem is, best amateur boxers are not amateurs anymore, they train like pros and get paid for it. This is much the reason why the level of US Olympic boxing has dropped so dramatically. That's why we should talk about Olympic style boxing instead of amateurs these days

 

This. Plus how ridiculous would it be that Carl Lewis couldn't participate in long jump since he has already competed in running, no matter how well he might do. That's exactly what is going on in Olympic boxing

 

Fair enough. It's not something I'm passionate about either way. Although I'd argue fewer boxers and fewer boxing gyms in the US has contributed to a lack of quality amateurs.

 

hmmm...not sure this is analogous.

Athletics should always have the best competing in the Olympics. As i said before...i don't think it's amateur vs professional, per se, I think it's more to do with what is the pinnacle acheivement of the sport in question.

Football (soccer) has World Cup...therefore Olympic football champion is a nonsense title.

Tennis has the four majors, no one really cares to win the Olympic title (it's a nice to have...but they'd rather win a major).

Now Basketball is tricky. It SHOULD be an Olympic Sport since the NBA is basically US focused (sure NBA has non-us players participating as well...but you get the idea). So there are basketball players in many non-US countries that deserve the chance of a big award to aim for. So to re-think my earlier position...if Basketball is an Olympic Sport (which it should be..since it is a global sport and all the non-US athletes to have something to aim for) then it should have the best players.

 

I've watched five or six fights so far. I went in with an open mind. In fact, I was looking forward to following some fighters through to the medal fights.

It's just really shitty stuff.

 

I dunno why, but I'm never interested in watching Olympic Boxing. The headgear, the scoring system, the 3 rounds....i dunno....just not appealing to me.

 

I feel exactly the same way.

I love boxing, and I always enjoying watching the Olympics, so why not watch Olympic boxing?

It just fucking sucks though, and I disagree with Jake about the talent level. No one I've seen so far seems anywhere NEAR as good as Lomachenko was in the Beijing Olympics, and all honestly, I'm not sure I've seen anyone that is even better than Scrubby James.

 

Lomachenko fights now one division higher btw, he is at lightweight and considered as the biggest favorite. He got through the first round on bye

 

Thanks for the info, I wondered about Chenko, I hadn't even heard anything about him in the run up to these Olympics. When is his first fight?

The only worry is fighting one division higher. He looked pretty small even in his own division to me.

 

Well that should make his run more compelling. I'll be watching his fights too.

 

I think if you remove Lomachenko then the talent level, atmosphere, and excitement of fights has been greater in 2012 vs. 2008 so far.

 

It will be on Thursday

 

Does he plan on turning pro?

 

1. Saul Alvarez would not win the olympics at his weight class.

2. The Olympics should be about the best amateur athletes in the world, not the best athletes. Of course, once the USA could no longer win basketball with their college players things had to change and did and other sports followed suit. Nobody gives a shit if a guy earning $100,000/year participates. But a guy earning $1,000,000/year is a pro.

3. Boxing fans should not want the olympics to include pros. Most of the very best would not participate and it would be nothing more than glorified Prizefighter and mean nothing.

 

This ladies and gentlemen, is the question of a worried man.

 

No. I don't like your faggy brothers. I don't care where fighters come from.