Tim Bradley got on his soapbox this week to lecture Turki Al-Sheikh, telling him that he has done nothing to improve boxing other than making some “good fights.” Tim feels that once Turki leaves the sport, things will be just as bad as before he arrived.
Commissioner Callout
Bradley says he wants Turki to create a commissioner-like person that “oversees” the sport in the same way as the NFL and NBA. Those leagues have appointed commissioners that oversee the management and path of the teams.
It’s unclear whether Turki would want to shoulder that kind of responsibility, as it would be a lot of hard work. He seems more interested in making good fights between fighters that he selects. It would be a full-time job for Turki to become the boxing commissioner if he could make that happen.
“Why don’t you help us build a union so the fighters can stand strong and get their promoter or whatever,” said Tim Bradley on social media, lecturing Turki Al-Sheikh. “Why don’t you give us a World Boxing Council, someone that looks over the entire [sport]? I know we’ve got the WBC, but you know what I mean.
“Someone to oversee like the NFL [i.e., Commissioner for management of the sport, appointed by the teams in the league] and the NBA [commissioner, similar to the NFL, appointed by teams].
“You can have the headquarters in America, and you can have the headquarters over there [Saudi Arabia], and they can all work together to bring boxing back together the right way. You do stuff like that, then you get my attention. You do stuff like that, then I get behind you.
“I’ll get behind you, Turki, for real, because that’s what boxing really needs. When you’re gone, Turki, when you decide to go, we’re going to be back to square one. You made some great fights [e.g., Fury vs. Usyk & Beterbiev vs. Bivol], but boxing hasn’t changed a thing. You haven’t changed s***.
Fixing Boxing’s Future
“So, my boxing viewpoint is different from y’all viewpoint. Y’all getting the fights that you want, which is great. It’s fantastic, but that’s not going to solve all the issues that boxing has. We need one governing body overlooking the entire sport,” said Bradley.
Tim Bradley says if Turki REALLY wants to save Boxing 🥊, “he needs to start a union for old and new fighters and have boxing under one governing body that rules over the entire sport like the NBA and NFL.
Turk is just putting a band-aid on boxing-
🎥 @Timbradleyjr #Boxing pic.twitter.com/IRDdpYgurH
— Pound4Pound (@Pound4our4Pound) January 17, 2025
In the past, promoters worldwide put on many high-priced, low-quality cards, and much of the interest in boxing disappeared. Too many events were put behind a PPV paywall, preventing fans from seeing fights unless they were willing to pay $70 to watch mostly mismatches.
The promoters made things worse by always matching their fighters against opponents who could not win. That still goes on today, and we’ve even seen it on some of Turki’s cards with promoters stacking the undercards in fights with no competitive value.