The World Boxing Council (WBC) is an international professional boxing organization. It is among the four major organizations which sanction professional boxing bouts, alongside the World Boxing Association (WBA), International Boxing Federation (IBF) and World Boxing Organization (WBO).
The World Boxing Association (WBA), formerly known as the National Boxing Association (NBA), is the oldest and one of four major organizations which sanction professional boxing bouts, alongside the World Boxing Council (WBC), International Boxing Federation (IBF) and World Boxing Organization (WBO). The WBA awards its world championship title at the professional level. Founded in the United States in 1921 by 13 state representatives as the NBA, in 1962 it changed its name in recognition of boxing's growing popularity worldwide and began to gain other nations as members.
Miguel Ángel Cotto Vázquez is a Puerto Rican former professional boxer who competed from 2001 to 2017. He is a multiple-time world champion, and the first Puerto Rican boxer to win world titles in four weight classes, from light welterweight to middleweight. In 2007 and 2009, he reached a peak active pound for pound ranking of seventh by The Ring magazine. Cotto started out his career as a hard-hitting pressure fighter, but evolved over the years into a more refined boxer-puncher as he moved up in weight.
Floyd Joy Mayweather Jr. is an American boxing promoter and former professional boxer who competed between 1996 and 2017. He retired with an undefeated record and won 15 major world championships spanning five weight classes from super featherweight to light middleweight. This includes the Ring magazine title in three weight classes and the lineal championship in four weight classes. As an amateur, he won a bronze medal in the featherweight division at the 1996 Olympics, three U.S. Golden Gloves championships, and the U.S. national championship at featherweight. After retiring from professional boxing in August 2017, he transitioned to exhibition boxing.
The Ring magazine was established in 1922 and has named a notable boxing Event of the Year since 1993, based on the magazine's writers' criteria.
Showtime Championship Boxing is a television boxing program that aired on Showtime. Debuting in March 1986, it was broadcast live on the first Saturday of every month. Showtime Championship Boxing, which was very similar to HBO World Championship Boxing, featured Mauro Ranallo on play-by-play, Al Bernstein as the color analyst, Jimmy Lennon as ring announcers, and Jim Gray as reporter.
The Sugar Ray Robinson Award is given to the Boxing Writers Association of America's Fighter of the Year.
In combat sports where champions are determined by challenge, the lineal championship in a weight class represents an intangible world title first held by the victor of a bout between top contenders in the division. A fighter who defeats the reigning champion in a match within the same weight class becomes the next lineal champion. In professional boxing, the lineal champion is informally known as "the man who beat the man."
Oscar De La Hoya vs. Manny Pacquiao, also billed as The Dream Match, was a professional boxing match contested on December 6, 2008. Pacquiao defeated De La Hoya via technical knockout when De La Hoya decided not to continue with the fight before the start of the ninth round. The card was a co-production of Bob Arum's Top Rank Boxing and De La Hoya's Golden Boy Promotions and was aired live on pay-per-view (PPV) on HBO PPV. The fight is notable for propelling Manny Pacquiao to full-blown superstar status in much of the western world, as Oscar De La Hoya symbolically "passed the torch", so to speak, to Pacquiao. This would mark De La Hoya’s final professional fight when he retired from boxing in 2009.
Santos Saúl Álvarez Barragán, commonly known as Canelo or Saúl Álvarez, is a Mexican professional boxer. He has held multiple world championships in four weight classes, from light middleweight to light heavyweight, including unified titles in three of those weight classes and lineal titles in two. In 2021, Álvarez became the first and only boxer in history to become the undisputed champion at super middleweight, holding this distinction until July 2024. He has also held the Ring magazine super middleweight title since 2020.
Boxing in the 2010s includes notable events about boxing which occurred between 2010 and 2019. The decade saw high intensity action in the welterweight division. The match between veterans Floyd Mayweather Jr. and Manny Pacquiao broke PPV records. The broadcast of the fight in the Philippines was watched by nearly half the country's households. Mayweather retired at a record 50-0-0 while Pacquiao became the first eight division champion. The middleweight division saw immense action in the later years of the decade. After a draw in 2017, Canelo Alvarez ended Gennady Golovkin's long reign in 2018. The heavyweight division was dominated by Klitschko brothers before Wladimir's loss to Tyson Fury in 2015. Other talents that emerged were Anthony Joshua, Deontay Wilder and undisputed cruiserweight champion Oleksander Usyk.
Manny Pacquiao vs. Joshua Clottey, billed as The Event, was a professional boxing match contested on March 13, 2010, for the WBO welterweight championship. The bout was held at Cowboys Stadium, in Arlington, Texas, U.S. This match was put together after the long awaited superfight between Manny Pacquiao and Floyd Mayweather Jr. had fallen through.
Floyd Mayweather Jr. vs. Miguel Cotto, billed as Ring Kings, was a professional boxing match contested on May 5, 2012, for the WBA (Super) super welterweight championship. The bout was held at the MGM Grand Garden Arena in Las Vegas, Nevada, United States. Mayweather won the fight by unanimous decision in what was deemed to be a clear, but very competitive fight.
Floyd Mayweather Jr. vs. Canelo Álvarez, billed as The One, was a boxing light middleweight championship superfight. The bout was held on September 14, 2013, in the MGM Grand Garden Arena, at the MGM Grand Hotel & Casino in Las Vegas, Nevada, United States, on Showtime PPV.
Floyd Mayweather Jr. vs. Marcos Maidana II, billed as Mayhem, was a professional boxing match contested on on September 13, 2014, for the WBC light middleweight title and the WBA, WBC, and The Ring welterweight championship.
Manny Pacquiao vs. Jessie Vargas, billed as The Legend/The Champ, was a boxing match for the WBO welterweight championship. The event took place on November 5, 2016 at the Thomas & Mack Center in Las Vegas, Nevada. Pacquiao won the fight by unanimous decision and took the WBO welterweight title. The fight sold 300,000 pay-per-view (PPV) buys in the United States (US), earning an estimated $18 million in pay-per-view revenue.
Manny Pacquiao competed in professional boxing from 1995 to 2021. Regarded by boxing historians as one of the greatest professional boxers of all time, Pacquiao is the only boxer in history to win twelve major world titles in eight different weight divisions. He is also the first boxer in history to win the lineal championship in five different weight divisions, as well as being the first boxer in history to win major world titles in four of the original eight weight divisions of boxing, also known as the "glamour divisions": flyweight, featherweight, lightweight and welterweight.
