Boxing Crowns a New Undisputed Champion
On October 12, Boxing crowned its fourth Undisputed Champion, Artur Beterbiev. Beterbiev won a majority decision against Bivol to win the Undisputed Light Heavyweight Championship. Beterbiev had come in as a slight underdog, with the betting line settling at -126 for Bivol and +104 for Beterbiev.
It was a competitive match, with each fighter often trading rounds back and forth. Unlike some other recent undisputed fights, like Crawford v Spence, this was not a beatdown nor an easy fight to score.
The final scorecards read 115-113 and 116-112 for Beterbiev, with the final judge giving it a 112-112 draw. Fights are scored off of a 10-point must system, with the winner of each round receiving ten points and the loser receiving nine or less. A knockdown is an automatic 10-8 round for the fighter who knocks down their opponent. Otherwise, a judge must believe a fighter was incredibly dominant in a round for them to win a round 10-8 without a knockdown.
In boxing, there are four organizations that hand out championship belts: The WBA, WBC, IBF, and WBO. Before 2021, only two men had simultaneously won all four belts within their weight classes. For women, ten fighters have become undisputed since 2014.
Due to boxing’s decline in popularity over the years, many champions are not willing to fight unless they can earn the maximum amount of money possible. For male fighters, it is more common to defend your title against non-champion challengers than to lose it to another champion. Whereas with women’s boxing, since the viewership is lower, it is the most common to fight other champions.
However, in the last three years, eight men became undisputed champions due to the Arab international influence in Boxing. Countries like Saudi Arabia and the UAE have handed out massive paydays to fighters in order to get them to fight in their countries. Not only do the fighters benefit, but these countries get an increase in tourism and are given the ability to reshape their reputations. There is concern that once these countries start to hand out fewer paydays to fighters, these matchups will stop occurring so often.
