Even in 2015, the back-and-forth stance is still frustratingly prevalent in the industry.

Boxing is one of the oldest sports out there and as such has a lot of history, baggage, and in some ways old school ways.

There are many unfair and unwanted stereotypes associated with sport regarding things like corruption and fixation, which in my opinion are totally inaccurate, insults and prejudices that point to sport in the current era of 2015.

I can’t comment on how things were in the past, but what I can comment on is today’s weather and since I started boxing journalism in recent years.

The sport is now essentially run by global television networks, sports management companies, and sports promotion companies. In 2015, you would no longer get away with mass corruption in any sport – you would be found out.

I’m not saying that nothing bad ever happens in sport, that would be naive. But, in my opinion, the same can be said for any professional sport or any professional business.

When money enters the equation, there will always be unscrupulous people looking to make a quick buck or take shortcuts.

One thing that does not yet exist in today’s game is the politics of boxing. In this article I will not name any names for the purposes of fairness, balance and objectivity.

At a time when the sport is really flourishing again and it’s on its way back to the mainstream media for a variety of reasons, including major TV broadcasters investing in the sport again and the Floyd Mayweather vs Manny super fight. Pacquiao, we are still seeing a lot of big fights go unrealized, which is very frustrating.

A well-known observer within the game recently defined the landscape of modern boxing quite well. I thought, “It’s annoying that the big fights we want are the ones we’re least likely to see. Welcome to the modern world of doing what you love about boxing.”. How right he was!

In today’s weather there are still promoters fighting, that hasn’t changed. However, what they fight for, yes. In the past, boxers were almost slaves to the promoters’ less fair contracts. All that has changed now.

Promoters work for boxers today and are more motivated by money than ever, because there is possibly less money in the business for them compared to what they used to exploit boxers years ago.

The politics of boxing today is dominated by terms and arguments like “Side A versus side B”, “we bring more money to the table than you”, “Your fighter doesn’t do the pay-per-view numbers that ours do”etc.

Professional boxing has always been a money business, but now more than ever in my opinion. You’re seeing new age promoters and managers emerge right now, at the time of social media and quasi-public bargaining.

This has been combined with the less than willing nature of many of the key old school players to embrace modern technologies like social media and the internet.

Sadly, they haven’t had a choice at this stage, but often their egos don’t allow them to interact with the promoters and powerful players in the game that come from this newer, cooler, more transparent tech push generation, where the customer (the Fight fan) expects a better product than ever (the best boxers fight the best boxers).

The sport of boxing is going through many changes globally right now. Politics will always be there, sadly that’s just human nature in any business.

But with the way that technology and the internet continue to influence sport and indeed all of sport, I believe that the transparency of these policies will only continue to surface more and more in the years to come.

Boxing has no choice but to change due to the many other combat sports products embracing new technology and more importantly putting on the best fights.

Although it will. Boxing has been around for a long time and will, in my opinion, return to its glory days before the end of this decade.

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