Quote Originally Posted by Nitrodaze View Post
I hear you, but Rumble in the jungle is not representative of the situation either. The technology of the time and the telecommunication challenge of televising the fight was somewhat particular. It was a model that is akin more to pay per view than your normal fights of the time.
At the end of the day it is about the show, be it an individual event or a team event as in F1. Accessibility of the show to the masses is important to the wider appeal of the achievement of the cream of the sport that are the champions. My point is, when the show moves into an exclusive accessibility situation, exposed to a few, it loses it wider appeal and as a result respect falls as a consequence. The broader recognition of the cream of the sport as in boxing is quite dramatically reduced. The broader interest drops as a consequence as well.

A larger number of people across the globe can name most of the drivers in the current season. Not alot of people can tell you of the boxers in recent time. Which is sad as the social banter of boxing has moved on to other sports; football, baseball car racing etc everything other than boxing.
Well yes it is sad, but Boxing has quite a bit of competition in pugilism (UFC and the like), and really is another sport imo, with events that are made for pay TV. On F1 there has never ever been anything close to all races being broadcast free, and live in the USA. It was easier to watch when SpeedTV broadcasted it, as they would broadcast all practices, quali, and the races. Since it has gone to NBC the coverage is much worse than it was with Speed with many more commercials