America at Large:We have found it consistently bewildering that prominent British-based boxers like Lennox Lewis and Ricky Hatton, having been presented with an International Boxing Organisation belt to go along with their more credible hardware, included it on their CVs as if the distinction was a matter of pride, writes George Kimball.
It struck us that it was not unlike an academic boasting that in addition to a PhD, he also earned a driving licence. Although come to think of it, in some parts of the world it might be more difficult to obtain a driving licence than an IBO title.
The world's boxing fans have enough to be confused about these days, with four more-or-less legitimate sanctioning bodies dispensing championship belts. The waters are further muddled by at least half a dozen more of these fly-by-night organisations, and while no knowledgeable person would take them seriously, their existence is abetted by promoters and television networks eager to pass off their products as "world title events".
This Saturday night's triple header at Connecticut's Foxwoods Casino is a case in point. The Showtime network, which is televising it, the Mashantucket Pequot tribal nation, which is hosting it, and Gary Shaw, who is promoting it, are all describing it as an evening of "three world championship fights". But calling it that doesn't make it so. Two of Saturday night's bouts - Vernon Forrest's WBC light-middleweight defence against Italian Michele Piccirillo and Filipino Nonito Donaire's IBF flyweight contest versus Luis Maldonado of Mexico - are indeed world title bouts.
But Antonio Tarver, who faces journeyman Danny Santiago in the purported main event, hasn't held a recognised world title in three years. The bogus IBO "title" for which Tarver and Santiago, two Florida-based boxers, will compete will be considered legitimate only in certain precincts of metropolitan Miami.
"It's very significant to me," protested Tarver when we reminded him of the IBO's irrelevancy the other day. "I mean, there've been some great champions who've come before me to be the champion for the IBO, and I think it's time for them to get the recognition that they deserve."
Although it claims to have been founded as an alternative to the established sanctioning bodies, the IBO has over the years demonstrated itself to be a bigger joke than any of them. While it has occasionally managed to attach itself to the coattails of legitimate world champions (Lewis, Hatton, Wladimir Klitschko, and for a time, Floyd Mayweather Jr), its record of crowning its own champions in IBO-only sanctioned fights has been nothing short of preposterous.
The IBO boasts it is the only boxing sanctioning body to rely on computerised ratings and holds itself up as a model of "honest ratings, integrity, and truthfulness", but when the opportunity for some fast cash presents itself, you can take it to the bank those "honest" computerised ratings go right out the window.
When Tarver, coming off wins over Glen Johnson, Roy Jones Jr, and Sylvester Stallone, fought Bernard Hopkins last year, only the IBO title was at stake. Hopkins won, but the IBO subsequently withdrew recognition from Hopkins in order to sanction a fight between the loser, Tarver, and Kosovo's Elvir Muriqi, number 36 on the IBO's computerised list of contenders.
Nor did the organisation hesitate to sanction this weekend's bout between Tarver and Santiago, even though the challenger is rated the 43rd-best light heavyweight by the IBO itself.
Just three weeks ago, at another Connecticut casino, the IBO awarded its 122-pound "world championship" belt to Hartford's Mike Oliver, even though neither the winner nor the loser (Al Seeger) was among the organisation's top 10.
The IBO, on its website, asks that its credibility be judged on "ultimately, the quality of our champions". Fair enough. We've already noted that Klitschko and Hatton accepted IBO recognition in fights that were actually contested for other, more credible, titles. (Add to this Donaire, whose IBO belt was a tag-along when he stopped IBF champion Vic Darchinyan last summer.) Let's examine the credentials of a few other IBO "world champions": last February in Florida, Poland's Tomas Adamek lost his WBC light-heavyweight title to Chad Dawson. In his next fight, in Poland, Adamek was awarded the IBO cruiserweight title for stopping Panamanian Luis Andres Pineda. Pineda's principal qualification was apparently that he had been knocked out in earlier challenges for two bona fide cruiserweight titles.
Last July Darchinyan lost to Donaire in Connecticut. Not three months later Darchinyan was back in the ring and fighting another Filipino, Federico Caturbay (now 20-14-3), won a points decision, and was proclaimed the IBO's super-flyweight champion.
After Joe Calzaghe's convincing win over Mikkel Kessler in Cardiff earlier this month, you probably thought IBF champion Lucien Bute was all that stood between the Welshman and undisputed status. Guess again, grasshopper. Not according to the IBO.
Colombian Fulgencio Zuniga, beaten by Daniel Santos in his only genuine title fight, and knocked out by current middleweight champ Kelly Pavlik in 2005, owns the IBO 168-pound title by virtue of his win over the Australian-based Russian Victor Oganov in September.
The IBO junior middleweight champion is the immortal Attila Kovacs, about whom we could probably tell you more if he ever fought outside of Hungary, which he has not for many years.
There may be no way around this nonsense, but the first step could be undertaken the next time the IBO tries to offer one of its belts to an authentic world champion. The response ought to be, "Thanks, but no thanks!"
