The Good, the Bad and the Ugly of Boxing in 2016

It's been an up-and-down year for boxing.

Maybe we're just being kind.

The year 2016 in the sweet science has produced its share of good, bad and ugly. 

There have been some quality fights that delivered the goods, but the fans absolutely have the right to be angry, annoyed and disappointed over the many high-profile bouts that were talked about. 

And talked about.

And then didn't get made. 

Here we take a look at all the things boxing got right in 2016.

And the things it got wrong.

And the things that were just plain ugly.

This isn't meant to be a comprehensive list. There are definitely things that we missed that should be on here, and you're encouraged to add as many as you can in the comments section.

Good: Vargas vs. Salido

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You knew when it was announced that you needed to clear your schedule.

Francisco Vargas and Orlando Salido belong to a unique breed of fighter.

Boxing is a violent sport, but these two Mexican warriors are willing to put their bodies on the line and engage in a compelling but-not-for-the-squeamish brand of ultraviolence rarely seen at a time when fighters care more about bottom lines than adoration and respect from the fans.

Vargas entered on the heels of a slugfest with equally-uncaring-about-his-long-term-health Takashi Miura. He rallied from behind in the 2015 Fight of the Year to stop his Japanese foe and capture a super featherweight championship. There were times when both men looked out of the fight.

Salido, who is the perfect test case for why you should always dig deeper into a fighter's record, twice engaged in spirited wars with Roman "Rocky" Martinez in 2015. He lost the first contest in April but bounced back five months later and was saddled with a draw that should've been a win.

Vargas vs. Salido—to the shock of nobody—was 36 minutes of pure blood and guts between a pair of fighters who absolutely refused to take a single step back for 12 rounds. It encapsulated everything about why we watch the sport, and it ended the Fight of the Year discussion with six months remaining in the year.

It was that good.

Bad: Canelo and GGG Reaching for Welterweights

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Canelo Alvarez and Gennady Golovkin are on the path to becoming this generation's Floyd Mayweather and Manny Pacquiao. That's certainly not an insult, but, in this context, it sure is a criticism.

More on that in a bit.

Canelo waltzed into 2016 as the lineal and WBC middleweight champion of the world. Nobody doubts his case as a genuine blockbuster star at the box office. His appeal is obvious, and he's made the most of it.

Which made his decision to reach down and fight welterweight (with documented chin issues) Amir Khan all the more perplexing. Yes, it was a bigger event than fight, but it was a colossal mismatch, and nobody in the boxing community ever thought different. 

Khan did somewhat better than expected but ended up getting epically knocked out with a right hand in the sixth round. It ended exactly how it was destined to end and the way everyone expected.

He even admitted recently that the fight was a mistake, per Joshua Evans of International Business Times.

Golovkin also reached down to face a welterweight, though, in his defense, Kell Brook was big for his weight, and the Kazakh destroyer literally couldn't find any bigger and better names to both say they want to fight and then sign the contract.

Lots of guys said the former, but none were willing to do the latter.

That fight was more competitive, but, like Canelo-Khan, ended exactly according to expectations.

Ugly: Inactivity of Big-Name Fighters

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Dan Rafael of ESPN penned a piece last week in which he detailed the many disappointments that boxing fans have had to endure in what has been trying year for the sport. One of the most grievous was buried pretty deep in the piece. 

It's the large number of fighters—many who fight under the Premier Boxing Champions' banner—that have fought only once in 2016. Some of the fighters he lists haven't seen the inside of a boxing ring at all. 

That's completely inexcusable.

Daniel Jacobs, the WBA's secondary middleweight titlist, has only fought once since destroying Peter Quillin last December. He followed up that huge victory with a completely pointless rematch win over Sergio Mora. His momentum is totally stalled.

Keith Thurman and Shawn Porter engaged in a tremendous fight but have been on the shelf since. Thurman turned back Porter that night in a fight that was intense, filled with action and might've been Fight of the Year if not for Vargas-Salido.

Both guys deserve better than one outing a year.

Badou Jack and James DeGale only fought once in a year that should've been about hyping their January unification contest on Showtime. 

So much for that.

Rafael also lists Adonis Stevenson, Andre Berto, Jermell Charlo, Erislandy Lara, Adrien Broner, Rances Barthelemy, Gary Russell Jr. and Lee Selby among his fighters who have only see one night of action this year.

Lamont Peterson and Quillin haven't fought at all.

That's a disturbing trend, and it's killing the careers of these fighters.

Good: Kovalev vs. Ward

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It's exceedingly rare in boxing today to see two pound-for-pound stars doing battle in the prime of their careers. It's a money game now—always has been but more than ever—and far too many fighters just don't want the risk when they can take easy paydays.

Sergey Kovalev and Andre Ward will buck that trend with each man taking on by far the toughest assignment of his career November 19 at the T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas. It's by far the biggest fight on the boxing calendar this year and one of the biggest in light heavyweight history.

Kovalev has unified three-fourths of his division and is widely recognized as the best fighter in the world at 175 pounds. His two wins over Jean Pascal and a vicious beatdown of ageless wonder Bernard Hopkins established that beyond a shadow of a doubt.

His trademark mean streak combined with his ring skill make him one of the most fearsome fighters in the game today.

Ward would probably have a claim to the title of best pound-for-pound fighter in the world had he not spent several years of his career on the shelf due to poor management and various lawsuits against his late promoter. Those were bad decisions, but his in-ring talent is beyond question. 

His pure boxing skill is off the charts, even if he's struggled to develop a fanbase due to his long absences and a style that isn't always pleasing to the eye. He's exceptional at timing and distance, and he might be the only guy in the world who can stand up the the Krusher. 

This is a genuine 50-50 fight.

Either man could win, and that makes it can't-miss in a year of so many can't-watch fights.

Bad: The Middleweight Mess

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Give the middleweight division some credit; it has the best talkers in the game.

Canelo keeps talking about how much he wants to fight GGG.

It seems he doesn't, at least not any time in the near future, but that's not going to stop the new face of boxing from wearing T-shirts that say he won't back down when he's heading to the ring to fight a no-name opponent.

(In case you were wondering, that was written on his shirt the night he fought Liam Smith in Texas.)

He was either trolling us all, or he genuinely believes we're collectively dumb.

Ditto for Billy Joe Saunders, who only seems willing to fight Golovkin when he's already got a fight lined up or when the criticism of him for one of the weakest title runs (he hasn't fought anyone since winning the belt but has pulled out of two subpar defenses) in middleweight history heats up.

Daniel Jacobs called him out after knocking out Sergio Mora in a pointless rematch, but when a purse bid change (he wanted a 60-40 split rather than the conventional 75-25) was rejected by the WBA, he suddenly needed an excessive amount of time to train and killed a fight until next year.

Maybe.

It's ridiculous when one man who claims himself to be the new face of boxing (or at least that's what his promoter says) and two men who claim to be champions of the world act like such divas in avoiding the best fighter in their division.

It used to be that those were the fights guys wanted.

They demanded the toughest guy in the yard.

Not anymore.

Ugly: Tyson Fury's Personal Problems

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We're all human beings first, so all boxing fans, whether you like the fighter or the man, should be hoping that Tyson Fury gets the help he needs to turn his life around. The now-former heavyweight champion twice pulled himself from rematches with Wladimir Klitschko before opening up to Stayton Bonner of Rolling Stone about his drug problems.

Things spiraled quickly out of control for the towering Brit shortly after he captured the heavyweight championship of the world via stunning unanimous decision over Klitschko last November.

And now we know that much of his erratic behavior stemmed from a serious cocaine problem. He needs to focus on getting himself better, and boxing should be the furthest thing from his mind right now.

But the heavyweight division he leaves behind is currently in a state of flux that's probably better described as a mess. 

Anthony Joshua holds the IBF Heavyweight Championship and looked set to defend it against Klitschko before that fight was shelved due to circumstances that could only be called bizarre. There were reports that Wlad wanted the fight only if the WBA belt was also on the line, followed by reports he was moving toward a fight with Lucas Browne for that very same belt.

Joshua will now seek a new opponent after Klitschko reportedly injured his calf and will be out of action until next year. 

Deontay Wilder, who also holds a share of the heavyweight crown, will also be out until next year after suffering injuries to his arm in a title defense against Chris Arreola. 

Yikes.

Good: Closing the Year Strong

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Boxing has been almost completely absent from your television programming over the past couple of months. HBO hasn't shown a network fight since Golovkin's early-September knockout over Kell Brook, and Showtime has been off since Carl Frampton upset Leo Santa Cruz for a featherweight title in July.

It's just been dead air with boxing fans having very little to talk about.

And since they've had very little to talk about, they've often resorted to playing out the many reasons why so many of the big fights they'd hoped to see in 2016 never came to fruition. That's not how you keep a fanbase happy and satisfied.

Luckily the year is coming to an end with a bang, and 2017 should get off on the right foot.

Kovalev-Ward is the one we'll all be talking about, but HBO has also invested some decent coin into a November 26 super featherweight championship showdown between Vasyl Lomachenko and Nicholas "Axeman" Walters. 

That one features perhaps the best pure technical fighter in the game against a challenger with a big punch and underrated skill.

It's been a long time coming.

Showtime also recently announced its late-2016 and early-2017 lineup.

It'll conclude the year with a doubleheader featuring a featherweight title contest between Jesus Cuellar and Abner Mares and a junior middleweight title showdown between Jermall Charlo and Julian "J Rock" Williams.

Frampton and Santa Cruz will also meet in a rematch of their barnburner in January. 

Hopefully these are signs of things to come.

It's not how you start—it's how you finish.

Bad: Gouging the Fans on PPV

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Boxing has too many pay-per-view fights.

Some are worthy of asking fans to pay a bit extra, but it seems that we've had a few this year that were simply intended to try to gouge and force the fans into buying either a bad matchup or one that should've been on regular network television. 

Terence Crawford is one of the best young fighters in the sport. He's considered by many to be a potential future pound-for-pound king, but his unification bout with Viktor Postol—one of the more significant fights of the year—was unnecessarily shuffled off to PPV due to HBO's budget cuts.

That's not fair to Crawford, who probably had the signature win of his career missed by many fans.

Canelo's junior middleweight title victory over previously unknown (in the United States, at least) Liam Smith was an even bigger farce. 

Asking people to fork over extra cash to see the new face of boxing take on a guy barely in the top 10 of a division he moved back down to in order to avoid the fight fans really wanted to see?

Please.

PPV has its place, but far too often it's overused, even if fans have the ability to say no.

How many of you have sworn that you'd never buy this or that matchup, but on fight night hit the button because your loyalty trigger is activated? It happens all the time, and they rely on it, and that's why you get shoddy matchups.

Ugly: Olympic Boxing

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Before we focus on what was horrific about boxing at the 2016 Summer Olympics in Rio de Janeiro, it's worth congratulating Claressa Shields once again on her historic gold medal. She became the first American in Olympic history to defend a boxing gold (she also won in 2012 at the London Games) and will turn pro on the Kovalev-Ward card in November.

The rest of the tournament was a showcase of ineptitude and produced questionable decisions that were so shockingly bad that you had to wonder what the hell the judges were watching. It was disgraceful watching some of the fights and seeing the wrong person get their hand raised.

Michael Conlan (pictured above) has signed with Top Rank and will make his professional debut on St. Patrick's Day headlining a card at Madison Square Garden next spring. He was among the fighters screwed by the International Boxing Association (AIBA) and its inept judges.

He clearly defeated Russian Vladimir Nikitin in the quarterfinals but was robbed.

Conlan famously flipped off the judges and gave scathing interviews after the fight, accusing AIBA (International Boxing Association) of being "cheats," per Jeff Powell of the Daily Mail. 

AIBA has since announced bans for 36 officials who took part in the 2016 Games, but that's still not going to remove the stench of what was overall a pretty disgraceful showcase of the sport on the international stage.