Is Boxing Dead or Alive?  Is it on the comeback trail, and if so, when did it get off the proverbial trail? Is it still a mainstream sport, or simply an afterthought that is still fortunate enough to have a niche within premium cable networks? 

These are the questions we face as, what Dan Rafael of ESPN would call us, Fight Freaks.  That's right, we love boxing and we don't care who knows it.  But what is the state of the boxing union, so to speak.  Where does the sport we love, stand with the everyday sports fan on the street?  Lets go ahead and dispense with the obvious and get right down to the philosophical content of the matter.  The obvious is this.  Boxing has become so unknown and marginalized that most average sports fans don't even know who Manny Pacquiao is.   Can you imagine a world where someone didn't know who Michael Jordan was, or Wayne Gretzky.  That's the world us fight freaks are living in.  They don't know our Michael Jordan.

I think the best measure of a sports mainstream credibility is the amount of coverage it receives from ESPN.  The world-wide leader in sports essentailly dictates to us, what sports is, what matters in sports and what is the most important thing currently happening in sports.  And lets not confuse ESPN with some communist dictator who makes decisions on a personal whim.  ESPN works very hard to gauge their demographic.  That's what makes their coverage so credible in determining the pulse of the sports world.  They spend millions figuring out what people want to hear about.  And it's loud and clear what the people want.  They want LeBron James, the New York Yankees, the NFL Draft and anything pertaining to Tiger Woods sex life.

So where does that leave us?  Are we resigned to watching remote PPV cards on Justin.TV, or tape delay HBO PPV fights, a week after we know the outcome, or even worse, shell out 50 bucks on 3 crappy under-cards and a main event.   Since it does not seem likely that we'll be returning to the glory days of the Sweet Science, back when you could see Muhammad Ali on ABC sports, we'll simply have to make the best of the lot we've been given.  The outlook is not entirely grim though.  The internet has helped rejuvenate our sport by forming an invisible community of fans who interact via Forums, Blogs and torrent sites.  

So what is the state of the union? 

 My conclusion is this.  Boxing is not dead.  The self-inflicted wounds of the Boxing industry are real, and evident.  But the life-blood of the sport remains in its loyal fans.  So as long as we are around to ask 'is boxing dead,' then the answer will continue to be a resounding NO it is most certainly not.