Floyd Mayweather says there are too many belts, sanctioning bodies exploiting fighters

Floyd Mayweather has just publicly come out to ridicule the number of championship titles in boxing, with the WBC’s latest ‘Franchise’ distinction just the latest in the growing number of belts. Plenty of fans and media members have been critical of the number of world titles in boxing, with at least four major world titles in every weight class, and to be honest it’s not easy to provide a satisfactory explanation to casual fans who often ask me about why there’s more than one champion per division.

Mayweather himself thinks the number of title belts in boxing is only hurting the sport rather than help market it.

“This is not good for the sport of boxing,” Mayweather said in an interview with Showtime. “Now when a fighter fights, every fighter is a champion. Ain’t no such thing as super champion,” Mayweather said. “You guys are just taking extra money from all these fighters [by] getting extra money from sanctioning fees.”

The former pound-for-pound king and current promoter says that boxing needs to clean up its act with regards to titles, but there’s surely plenty other areas of the sport that could use a good house cleaning too.