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Boxing really needs a shot in the arm Yeah, we talk about boxing a lot at "A Sporting View," but that's because it's the sweet science, baby. When you break it down, it's all you're looking for in sports. It's the one-on-one match up. It's Magic Johnson on Larry Bird. It's Reggie Jackson stepping in against Nolan Ryan. It's Bo Jackson and Brian Bosworth. And I'm not too hyped up on the Ultimate Fighting Championship stuff, folks ... sorry. At its best, it's a bar fight. At its worst - and this was typically the case when those jujitsu guys dominated - it was two guys rolling around on the canvas. It may have been scientific, but it just wasn't sweet. Sure, they're getting their share of attention, but I doubt the sport is siphoning off as many fans from boxing as it is wrestling. Be that as it may, boxing needs a shot in the arm - something I've been carping about for a long time. Greedy promoters have led to an indigestible alphabet soup of councils and federations with watered down contenders and champions. To combat this, HBO Sports has taken the lead in trying to give us a story line again in boxing. Its promotion of the De La Hoya-Mayweather fight, with the weekly reality docudrama showing their training, definitely elevated the status of the fight in many people's eyes. And while they were down at the welterweights, HBO decided to stay and stake a claim. Rickey Hatton, Shane Mosley, Miguel Cotto - in many respects, HBO hopes these guys will turn out to be the next generation of Marvin Hagler, Sugar Ray Leonard and Tommy Hearns. Of course, it'd settle for another Arturo Gatti and Mickey Ward. And that's the other unsettling thing about HBO's latest storyline - they won't let the old stars fade away. Nothing was harder to watch than Gatti, one of the most popular and exciting fighters of all-time, get his head handed to him by Alfonso Gomez - a 17-3-2 fighter with only five knockouts going into the fight. It was the last fight on Gatti's HBO contract, and it was a sad display of going to the well too many times. And that's why it was even weirder watching Jim Lampley and Larry Merchant exclaiming gleefully that Oscar De La Hoya would be moving back to the welterweight division. Waiting in the wings, on the decided downward slope of his career, is Roy Jones Jr. He wants a piece of Felix "Tito" Trinidad. "If two people - me and Tito - want it to happen, then nobody is going to be able to stop it," Jones, 38, told media last month. "This would be a fight that could fill Madison Square Garden or Yankee Stadium." Would it really? Better yet, should it? Mark Vasto is a veteran sportswriter and publisher of The Parkville (Mo.) Luminary.
(c) 2007 King Features Synd., Inc.
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