Billy’s Boxing Blog

Well I thought the only 140 pound fighters I would be talking about would be the ones fighting on Friday night but as it turns out the story that raised my dander the most today was the little gaff printed that said Timothy Bradley was stripped of his 140 pound WBC title. I may not have given it a second thought until I saw a letter from Bradley posted on the site that was obviously not meant to be seen by the general public.

That’s when the stink-o-meter went on Red Alert and I let my sniffer take over.

The question was simple.

Why the heck would the prestigious WBC put their Champion in a position to either relinquish his belt or be stripped? I mean, if memory serves me correctly Bradley earned his title the good old fashion way…he earned it. He traveled across the pond to dismantle Junior Witter and he went to Canada to successfully defend his belt against Holt, and oh yeah, he picked up another belt along the way, the WBO version.

To fill the void left by Bradley at the WBC the powers that be decided to let the afore mentioned Junior Witter back in the hunt and he is set to face the Don King promoted Devon Alexander.

BEEP BEEP BEEP!       WARNING WARNING!     FOUL  STENCH APPROACHING!

Now this is merely speculation on my part but if memory serves me correctly El Presidente Don Jose Sulaiman and Don King have been bedfellows for longer than most of us has been alive and their relationship has always raised more than a few eyebrows. Especially where title belt$ are concerned.  

And although I am certainly trying to insinuate any impropriety in this Bradley dilemma, I must tell you the Stink-o-meter will need to have it’s springs changed when this diddy is over. 

I mean…c’mon….Alexander is not rated by darn near every other sanctioning body (WBO has him at 8). Yet, the WBC sees fit to put him in a title fight against the guy Bradley beat handily to take his title.

It all stinks if you ask me…errr..I mean the Stink-o-Meter.

I asked Jose Sulaiman to help me better understand this situation and he wrote this kind letter of response:

Dear friend Mr. Trillo:
     I believe that the press release sent yesterday explains the case very clearly.  He relinquished his WBC title and refused to fight the WBC’s mandatory contender Devon Alexander.  I am sending to you separately a couple of documents that explain better this situation.
    In the past no other organization had given Bradley the merits that he had,but the WBC rated him as  # 1 and ordered a final elimination with the former super lightweight champion José Luis Castillo, who couldn’t make the weight and did not fight due to medical recommendations here in Mexico.  Even without a fight, we appointed Bradley as the official challenger to fight Junior Witter in England, who he beat by decision !!!
   We approved his fight against Holt with the condition that the winner would accept to fight the WBC’s official challenger next, and he sent a letter that I will be sending to you separately, where you will find that he stepped on his word and on his commitment and relinquished his WBC title.
   The WBC will not allow chaos in our organization, which would happen if we accept champions to rule the WBC, as if so, we better close our tent. 

                                          PLEASE ACCEPT MY BEST REGARDS.   José Sulaimán

We thank Jose for the quick response.

Here is my next concern.

Rumors abound that the winner of this weekends battle between Manny and Ricky will be thrust into the WBC number one position. Junior Witter will then be dropped in the rankings and Devon Alexander (Don King’s fighter) will be in the position to get a crack at the new Pound4Pound king.

It just seems to me the WBC could have waited a few more days to let the Pacquiao vs. Hatton battle play out and then let Bradley decide if he would face the winner and new WBC # 1. Instead, Bradley was put in a position where he felt he had no choice but to relinquish his belt.

Now you tell me….Does that stink or what?

This entry was posted on Wednesday, April 29th, 2009 at 3:31 am and is filed under Boxing. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.