Are We About to Give up on WBA Again?
By Teodoro Medina Reynoso
PhilBoxing.com
Tue, 02 Feb 2021
Pacquiao and Thurman holding their respective WBA belt.
If not for Manny Pacquiao and Nonito Donaire getting cracks and winning super belts at welterweight and bantamweight respectively, the recent couple of years or so, the World Boxing Association or WBA means very little in terms of prestige to Philippine boxing.
For since Donaire himself won then lost the first of his two super titles at featherweight in 2014, the only favor the WBA has given Filipino boxers was limited to granting them chances to fight and win its inconsequential interim titles (Randy Petalcorin, Reymart Gaballo, Jhack Tepora) and approving their challenges of its mostly Thai and Japanese world champions in the lower weight classes which all ended in bitter or controversial losses.
Back in 1968, the Philippines through the Games and Amusements Board (GAB) then headed by the mercurial duo of Governor Justiniano Montano and Atty Rudy Salud, spearheaded the pivot from the WBA to the then newly established World Boxing Council (WBC) where they later held high positions.
This was precipitated by the WBA's highly irregular and disrespectful removal of Flash Elorde from its rank of contenders almost as soon as Elorde lost his world championship to Japan's Yoshiaki Numata in June 1967.
Elorde, the inaugural world junior lightweight champion of both the WBA and the WBC, served both organizations with distinction from the time he won the title in 1960.
Certainly, the shabby treatment he got from the WBA was revolting.
Aside from this, Philippine boxing authorities as well their counterparts in other Asian and Latin American countries had long been critical of the WBA seeming discrimination and favoritism in appointing challengers in world title fights.
In all of Elorde's seven year reign, only one other Filipino, Roberto Cruz, managed to win a world title at junior welterweight in 1962 but his hold was very brief, lasting just a few months.
Under the WBC, Filipino fighters were given more opportunities to fight for world titles resulting to the troika of Pedro Adigue, Rene Barrientos and Erbito Salavarria becoming world boxing champions in rapid succession between 1969-70, making up for Elorde's title loss.
Filipino fighters would win more WBC world titles from then on, totaling to 18 as of the latest count out of the overall harvest of 64 that included titles won with the more recently formed IBF and WBO which accounted for a combined 28.
The older WBA which evolved from the National Boxing Association in 1933 antedating the more popular basketball NBA, could only account for 15 of those titles won by Filipino fighters. Prior to Elorde, Little Dado and Dado Marino won NBA/WBA titles at flyweight in 1940s and 1950s.
Note that Pancho Villa won his world title when there was no NBA yet while Small Montana and Ceferino Garcia won theirs under sanction of American state commissions, accounting for three of the total 64 titles won by Pinoys.
In fairness though, the WBA sanctioned the first world title fight involving a Filipino in the immediate post Elorde era in which Bernabe Villacampo became world champion by beating and retiring Horoyuki Ebihara in 1969.
Also the WBA gave Salavarria the chance to become world titlist again in after he lost his WBC flyweight crown via the sugared water bottle controversy versus Betulio Gonzales in Venezuela in 1973. Salavarria defeated Susumu Hanagata of Japan for the vacant WBA belt in 1975.
The WBA was also instrumental in the championship campaigns of Ben Villaflor (jr lightweight- two reigns), Luisito Espinosa
(bantamweight), Jesus Salud (super bantamweight), Morris East, the youngest Filipino boxing world titlist ( jr welterweight ), Joma Gamboa (light flyweight) and Brian Viloria (flyweight).
Considering the period covered, i.e. nearly 80 years from the 1940s, the 15 WBA world titles won by a dozen Pinoy fighters were too few and far in between compared to the 49 titles won under the WBC, IBF and WBO.
However, it should be noted that many top Pinoy fighters, including Manny Pacquiao until very recently, virtually ignored fighting under the aegis of the WBA for a long stretch.
In fact, interest in the WBA only aroused with Donaire and Pacquiao one after the other winning its super belts in 2018 at bantamweight and welterweight, respectively.
But Donaire has lost his WBA super title to Naoya Inoue in December 2019.
And just a few days ago, the WBA stripped Pacquiao of his welterweight super title and relegated him to the ambiguous status as champion in recess allegedly for his failure to make a defense within a prescribed period.
Manny seems disinterested to protest and appeal the decision despite the inconsistencies and loopholes in the WBA application of its own policies on the matter that can be used in hope of getting a reconsideration and possible overturn.
Given these, are we ready to again give up on and eschew the WBA?
The author Teodoro Medina Reynoso is a veteran boxing radio talk show host living in the Philippines. He can be reached at teddyreynoso@yahoo.com and by phone 09215309477.
Click here to view a list of other articles written by Teodoro Medina Reynoso.
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