Reality TV Turns Linebackers Into Heavyweights

For a long time, it’s been a common lament among American boxing fans that the heavyweight division is plagued by the fact that young, big athletes don’t box anymore – they play football and basketball. One of the strange realities of the new millennium is the ceding of the heavyweight title, in all it’s fractured, faded glory, by the United States to Russia and Eastern Europe. ↵↵But a new reality series, scheduled for the fall of ’08, is hoping to change all of that, and it’s turning to a likely place for its talent pool – the NFL Draft. American Champion is the name of the show that plans to start with 75 college football players from elite programs around the nation and see if any of them have what it takes to become heavyweight fighters. They will be drawing their contestants from among the best college players who don’t get selected in the 2008 NFL draft.↵

↵↵After the initial group of 75 is winnowed down to 30 by a boxing version of the NFL combine, they’ll be taught the fight game by a group of famous trainers and pitted against each other in a Contender-like tournament. At this point, at least one big-name trainer has signed on to the enterprise, none other than Floyd Joy Mayweather Sr. (Asked for comment about the show, Daddy Floyd responded that it was his understanding that he would be paid in cash.)↵

↵↵There’s no word yet as to what will become of the winner of this bizarre, American Idol-oriented heavyweight reality show. Presumably he’ll get a contract with a promoter and maybe some charity work from a good trainer (although I’m pretty sure Floyd Sr. will be long gone at that point) and then they will try and maneuver this guy into a shot at a heavyweight belt. ↵

↵↵At which point, I’ll guarantee you something right now – the “American Champion”, whoever he is, will get the crap beaten out of him. All in all, the mere concept of this show is an insult to boxing. Do people really think the sweet science is something that any big dude can be taught in a month and then become the best in the world at? I mean, why not train these chumps to make it in the NHL, or become professional tennis players, or Nobel laureates even? ↵

↵↵Or let me put it another way: don’t take some NFL reject – take the best athlete the league has to offer, take freakin Shawne Merriman. Let Floyd Sr. train him exclusively for a few months, and then put him in the ring with the tenth-rated prospect on Ring Magazine’s list of heavyweights. And watch him get the beating of his life. ↵

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