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Seeking common ground Report recommends single ranking system for boxing
Posted: Wednesday May 10, 2000 08:04 PM
WASHINGTON (AP) -- Boxers should be ranked by a single organization and their health and wallets should be better protected, according to a report released Wednesday by New York Attorney General Eliot Spitzer. The report also calls for the use of a "consensus" scoring method in which the median score of the three judges would be tabulated each round. Such a system would have lifted Lennox Lewis to a victory over Evander Holyfield in last year's disputed heavyweight bout at New York's Madison Square Garden, Spitzer said. Outrage over that fight, judged a draw but widely viewed as a Lewis win, prompted calls for boxing reforms. The report said that "over the decades too many professional boxers have been left destitute, penniless and punch drunk. Anti-competitive practices appear to be the norm, and professional boxers are subjected to exploitation daily." Spitzer, a Democrat and chairman of the boxing task force of the National Association of Attorneys General, was supposed to present the report in Washington with Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz. But stormy weather prevented the attorney general from departing New York's Laguardia Airport. "We need to do some real work to make boxing legitimate," Spitzer said by telephone. "The sanctioning bodies ranking system has been corrupt for many years." Currently, various sanctioning bodies compile their own rankings using different criteria. Sometimes, promoters are allowed to rank their own fighters. The Spitzer report calls for a ranking system to be developed and implemented by an organization comprised of boxing writers, broadcasters and historians. Spitzer said the recommendations in his report complement McCain's Muhammad Ali Reform Act which passed the Senate earlier this year. A slightly different version passed the House, so the two chambers are working on a compromise. McCain's legislation imposes a one-year limit on the promotional rights a promoter can demand from a boxer to stop the practice of promoters denying a boxer a bout unless he gets options on future bouts. It also bars promoters from having financial ties to the manager of a boxer. Like Spitzer's report, it calls for the boxing industry to develop guidelines for rankings that sanctioning organizations should follow. Among the Spitzer report's other recommendations:
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