By Norm Frauenheim
Boxing regulation, like colossal shrimp, is often a classic oxymoron, two words aligned yet always in conflict. After all, boxing is at its roguish best or perhaps worst when it avoids regulation. It’s been a way of doing business
These days, however, two emerging faces from the promotional side – one with unprecedented money and the other with White House connections – joined the regulatory side in an apparent effort to gain control over the balkanized game.
It’s hard to understand why else Prince Turki Alalshikh, the money man from the Saudi monarchy, and Dana White, UFC kingpin and friend of Donald Trump, played politics a week ago in seeking an endorsement from the
California State Athletic Commission.
Alalshikh and White, fresh off their triumph in the promotion of Terence Crawford’s masterful decision over Canelo Alvarez last month, are trying to push through the proposed Muhammad Ali Boxing Revival Act.
It’s supposed to replace the shopworn, often forgotten Ali Act, the original attempt to bring some ethics and order to a business known for notorious practices. For too long, fighters have been protected only by a sturdy mouthpiece.
Late Senators John McCain of Arizona and Harry Reid of Nevada had good intentions when they crafted the bill, introducing it in 1999 and enacting it in 2000. Both were former boxers. They understood the sport and the fighters. Both also got a lot of help and advice from Hall of Fame trainer and ringside commentator Emanuel Steward.
But all three are gone. Guess here, all three would see through what White and Alalshikh were doing at the California Commission. It was a campaign stop – a dog-and-pony show — for legislation that could strengthen their control of boxing when their Zuffa promotional banner debuts next year.
It’s evident that Alalshikh and White are trying to eliminate rivals and perhaps critics. White, an unchallenged giant in his promotion of mixed martial arts, says he wants to go into boxing without the old acronyms or rival promoters.
Part of the reported plan is to recognize only The Ring’s title.
It’s no coincidence that Alalshikh bought The Ring from Oscar De La Hoya last November for a reported $10 million. Then, De La Hoya, who has been feuding with White for years, thought he was selling a magazine, a century-old trademark. But now he knows he sold off a piece of what they intend to use as a further way dominate the business.
From this corner, however, it’s not clear that their proposed changes to 25-year-old legislation will have any more of a lasting impact than the original has had. The criticism of the McCain-Reid bill – bi-partisan and well-intended – is that it didn’t include any real way to enforce laws written to protect the fighters themselves.
An example: The Ali Act was supposed to eliminate the confusion about the difference between promoter and manager. But it’s still there, a conflict-of-interest that often leads to a double dip, leaving the unsuspecting fighter with only enough money for that new mouthpiece.
McCain, a Republican, and Reid, a Democrat, got a lot of endorsements for their legislation from fighters, media and fans when it was introduced.
But there’s no enforcement in another endorsement, which — for now — is the only thing fighters got from White and Alalshikh.
