You can argue about the stratification of boxing with all their divisions and promotions. You can talk about arrogant, boring fighters the jab their opponents to death. Fighters that fight not to lose. Fighters that want to take it to the cards. The lack of big name heavyweights. The rise in popularity of mixed martial arts. All of those are valid reasons for boxing’s waning appeal. The one thing that people will not stomach is fixed fights. Corrupt judges and fallty scoring can end the sport. And when you have talented athletes like Paul Malignaggi screaming at Max Kellerman that the sport is shit, you have a problem. From the good folks at Bloody Elbow:

What’s worse: incompetent MMA judges or corrupt boxing judges? Scott Christ explains what happened last night:

From my view, Malignaggi (26-3, 5 KO) largely dominated the fight defensively and with speed. He looked like the vintage Malignaggi that was a legit contender at 140 pounds. Diaz (35-2, 17 KO) did survive a bad cut this time around, and didn’t fight badly. But he had a horrible time closing distance on the longer, taller, quicker Malignaggi, and it was Paulie that made much of the fight go.

It was also, it should be noted, a highly-entertaining style collision between two guys that came to mix it up and win. They both needed it badly, and fought like it. But it was Malignaggi, in my opinion, that won the bout. And I’m not alone. Bad Left Hook scored it 116-112 for Paulie. HBO’s Harold Lederman scored it 115-113 for Malignaggi.”

I’m no fan of boxing.  I find it slow and dull compared to the multifaceted mixed martial arts.  That doesn’t mean that I wouldn’t LIKE to have another combat sport to pay attention to.  Until they dispel the phantom impropriety that haunts the sport. it will continue to be difficult to draw in fans like me looking for a reason to be interested.