The Fight of the Century

The Fight of the Century

As usual this is one man’s humble opinion, if you don’t agree, I am perfectly fine with it.

·       In 1971, both Ali and Frazier had legitimate claims to the title of World Heavyweight Champion. An undefeated Ali had won the title from Sonny Liston in Miami Beach in 1964, and successfully defended his belt up until he had it stripped by boxing authorities for refusing induction into the armed forces in 1967. In Ali's absence, the undefeated Frazier garnered two championship belts through devastating knockouts of Buster Mathis and Jimmy Ellis. He was recognized by boxing authorities as the World Champion. Unlike Mathis and Ellis, Frazier was plausibly Ali's superior, which created a tremendous amount of hype and anticipation for a match pitting the two undefeated fighters against one another to decide who was the true heavyweight champ.

·       Ringside seats were $150, each man was guaranteed 2.5 million dollars, in addition to the millions who watched this amazing hour of sporting history unfold on closed-circuit screens around the world the Garden buzzed with a sell-out crowd of 20,455 that provided a gate of 1.5 million dollars. ~Wikipedia

Mayweather vs Paquio

Today once again the Fight of the Century is being hyped and this time the fight is serious money for all involved including the consumers and sports fans (in some instances one and the same).  For the consumer the just to stay home and watch it on pay per view $99.99 on your local cable service.  Anyone traveling to Las Vegas to be close to the action I hear that hotel rooms that normally go for $200 dollars this weekend they are going for $1600 dollars according to reports earlier in the week.  That is 10 times higher than ringside seats went for during the fight of the century in 1971.  At last report earlier this week the going price for the cheapest ticket at the live event was $16,000.00 online.

I am not complaining because I am not in position to spend that kind of money on any kind of sporting event, but if I was, I’m sure that I could find a better way to spend my millions.

We are talking about two individuals that are going to knock each other’s brains out for all of maybe one hour, and each stands to make over 100 million for their participation.

I hate to think that there are people around the world whose life might be on the line because they don’t have the funds (20 or 30 thousand) to spend on a medical procedure that would save their lives, and our society very much like in the time of the Romans are gathering at the coliseum to watch two gladiators fight to near death (possibly). I like sports as much as the next guy or gal, but we are being scammed big time.

The best is yet to come….