Boxer Dadashev dies from Friday fight injuries
Some thoughts on the dangers of boxing:
- I have a libertarian attitude towards the sport. If you ban it, it will just take place in the back alleys. If boxers want to fight and they want to have people watch so they can make money doing it, I'll watch if I find it interesting. Boxers know the risks. They've not dogs or roosters. I've never heard one say that his sport should be banned: it's only outsiders who demand that.
- That doesn't mean that things can't be done to make the sport safer. It's been suggested that helmets be used like in the amateurs. I've also heard opinions that that would make little difference, for the same reason we hear about football: ti's the brain moving around inside the skull that produces the damage.
- Injuries tend to come from long, competitive fights, not one-sided fights with early knock-outs. By competitive, I don't mean fights that are even in the scoring. I just mean that both fighters continue fighting for three minutes a round in every round of the fight. One guy may be landing more punches or punching harder, but they are both going at it full bore. That's what happened in this fight. Dadachev landed his share of shots but was out-gunned. It's the accumulation of blows, not the power of a single punch that does the damage.
- Main events are 10 rounds. Why? Because we have 10 fingers? Amateur fights are three rounds yet Olympic titles are decided in those three rounds. The paying public may want more round than that for their buck. But how much research went into determining if ten rounds was the appropriate number for a main event? None?
- Why does a championship bout have to go 12 rounds? (it was 15 before
Duk Koo Kim died). "Those are the championship rounds! Without them nobody could really earn a championship!" The Super Bowl is a 60 minutes game. Does it need to be a a 90 minute game for the winner to truly be a champion?
- Do rounds have to be 3 minutes long? How much research went into that? Probably the same amount that went into main events being 10 ten rounds and championships being 12 rounds.
- Does the time between rounds have to be 1 minute? Would it help if it was longer? Maybe we could have a "halftime" like football or two breaks like hockey during which the fighters could be closely examined by the ring doctor or even be returned to the locker room for tests.
- Would it be possible to imbed something in the fighter's gloves that would be able to survive the punches and not cause a problem for either fight but which could transmit the force with which each blow lands? it could be used to score the fight and it could be used to determine when to end the fight or the round or when to examine a fighter.
Just some random thoughts about a sport that needs to do some thinking.
