I came across this video yesterday for the first time since I initially saw it last year and straight away, it evoked the same feeling in me that it did the first time.
I thought it would be an apt time to share the video as the year draws to a close, given all the negativity that has surrounded boxing in 2016, as a quick reminder as to why this sport of ours can be such a special one at times.
The video in question was in the build-up to a fight that ultimately let us down, granted, the Mayweather vs Pacquiao matchup on May 2nd, 2015.
But the principles and ideologies on the sport that the narrator recites during it’s short couple of minutes are ones that stand the test of time I truly believe.
No matter where the sport goes, at it’s core, it’s always been about and always will be about the fighters.
These above the norm, unique, incredible human beings that do something that mere mortals could only dream of for the entertainment of the masses will always be a draw.
The ‘Boxing Is Dead’ brigade (that saying has been around twenty plus years now) has been as vocal as ever this year as the sport transitions into a new time with it’s next generation of stars coming through, giving those who have always knocked the sport an opportunity in their mind to try to kick the sport when it’s down.
But how wrong they are though. Here’s why boxing will never die:
After watching the above and you felt like putting on the hoodie and hitting the road for a run, or getting out that old dusty pair of boxing gloves and hitting the bag – you wouldn’t be alone.
Boxing is a sport that creates those almost intangible, unquantifiable moments sometimes, where conventional logical can often have a funny way of been trumped by passion and who wants it more in the ring.
A craft and a science of hand to hand combat that has been honed as a sport for hundreds of years, by some of the most courageous human beings to ever walk the Earth.
As 2016 comes to a close for the sport of boxing while it has been a bag of mixed fortunes overall, the year is ending very strong with fights like Kovalev vs Ward just gone and indeed Lomachenko vs Walters this weekend.
The new year for 2017 is looking very strong already and the momentum of the sport is gaining once again, with news of BT Sport in the UK televising 30 live shows in conjunction with BoxNation next year and Premier Boxing Champions in the US looking like they will be committing to showing live boxing on network television more than ever before.
Boxing will never die.
2017 will be one heck of a year for the sweet science as it continues the process of reinventing itself during a transitional period in this new technologically driven era we find ourselves living in as a human race.
