On 8 June, 14 men and women will be inducted into the International Boxing Hall of Fame in Canastota, New York. Some, likeManny Pacquiao, clearly deserve the honor. Others – in my opinion – don’t. More egregiously, some fighters and other members of the boxing community who should be in the Hall of Fame have never even been on the ballot.
I’d like to highlight some of them. Let’s start with fighters and, for purposes of comparison, put their ring accomplishments side by side with those of one of the 2025 inductees: Vinny Pazienza.
Pazienza compiled a 50-10 ring record, with 30 KOs and 3 KOs by. He fought eight times for a major world championship and lost six of those fights. The wins were against lightly regarded Greg Haugen and Gilbert Delé. The losses were to Haugen (in a rematch), Roger Mayweather, Hector Camacho, Loreto Garza, Roy Jones Jr and Eric Lucas. Jones-Pazienza was notable because, in round four, Vinny became the first fighter in the history of CompuBox to fail to land a punch during a full three-minute round. Pazienza also decisioned an aging Roberto Duran twice in non-title bouts, survived a car crash, and had a movie made about his life.
Now let’s compare Pazienza’s credentials with those of three fighters who I think deserve to be in the Hall of Fame but have never even been on the ballot.
Jermain Taylor finished his career with a 33-4-1 (20 KOs, 3 KOs by) record. Bernard Hopkins held all four 160lb world championship belts and hadn’t been beaten in 12 years when he stepped into the ring to face Taylor in July 2005. Taylor beat Hopkins and, six months later, beat him again. In his next two fights after losing to Taylor, Hopkins dominated Antonio Tarver and Winky Wright.
Taylor also holds victories over former champions Raul Marquez, William Joppy, Kassim Ouma, Cory Spinks, and Jeff Lacy and fought to a draw against Wright. His only losses were to Kelly Pavlik (twice), Carl Froch, and Arthur Abraham.
Pavlik (40-2, 34 KOs) has the impressive credential of beating Taylor twice and winning five world championship bouts. The only losses of his career were by decision against Bernard Hopkins and Sergio Martínez.
Gerry Cooney (28-3, 24 KOs, 3 KOs by) was a devastating puncher who, at his peak, knocked out Jimmy Young, Ron Lyle and Ken Norton in consecutive fights (the latter two in the first round). He was defeated by Larry Holmes on a night when Holmes was as good as he would ever be and later lost to George Foreman and Michael Spinks. Cooney never won a world championship. But Hall of Fame matchmaker Bruce Trampler ranks him among the best 15 heavyweights of all time.
To repeat: Taylor, Pavlik and Cooney have never even been on the Hall of Fame induction ballot.
I also question the ongoing omission of several non-fighters from the ballot.
The Hall has an affinity for publicists. In recent years, Lee Samuels, Bill Caplan and Fred Sternburg have been inducted. All three did their job exceptionally well. But if the Hall of Fame wants a big tent and those three men are in it, Alan Hopper should be on the ballot.
For years, Hopper had the challenging job of serving as director of public relations for Don King. He was masterful in fulfilling the demands of that role and once explained, “I’ve always done my job as though I work for the media as well as Don. I return all calls. I answer my emails. I’m sensitive to the fact that people in the media are often on deadline. I try to be as friendly as I can to the people I meet. As far as I’m concerned, all of those things are part of being a professional.”
And let’s look at two even more troubling omissions from the Hall of Fame ballot.
Cedric Kushner made his name promoting heavyweights like Hasim Rahman, David Tua, Chris Byrd, Shannon Briggs, Oleg Maskaev, Corrie Sanders, Ike Ibeabuchi and Jameel McCline. He also built Shane Mosley into a star. BoxRec.com lists Kushner as the promoter of record for the staggering total of 466 fight cards contested around the world between 1982 and 2010.
Al Haymon has been at the center of the boxing universe for two decades. There were times when it seemed as though he was on the verge of “taking over boxing”. Now the Saudi Arabian General Entertainment Authority is the dominant force. But no one has had a greater influence on boxing over the past 20 years than Haymon. Other than Pacquiao, not a single one of this June’s inductees belongs in the Hall of Fame ahead of Haymon. But like Kushner, he has never even been on the ballot.
How did these oversights happen? Let’s look at the induction process.
Ed Brophy was the driving force behind the creation of the InternationalBoxingHall of Fame in 1990 and has served as its president ever since.
“Anyone can suggest to the Hall that a name be placed on the ballot,” Brophy explains. “Then the nominations are weighed by a review committee that also makes recommendations of its own and forwards the names to a screening committee that decides who appears on the final ballot.”
The review committee for the most recent Hall of Fame election consisted of writers Nigel Collins, Tris Dixon, Steve Farhood, Jack Hirsch, Graham Houston, Dan Rafael, Bobby Cassidy and Bernard Fernandez; historian Bob Yalen; jack-of-all-trades Don Majewski; publicist Fred Sternburg; and matchmaker Bruce Trampler.
But the real power in determining who gets on the ballot resides with Brophy and the screening committee which currently consists of manager Sean Gibbons, Lee Groves (a historian and researcher for CompuBox), and former chairman of the Nevada Athletic Commission Marc Ratner (who has worked for UFC for the past 19 years).
The number of actual electors varies from category to category with a high of approximately 200 electors in the “men’s modern” category and as few as 15 electors for “women trailblazers.” Too many of the electors are relative newcomers to boxing and have little understanding of anything that happened in the sport more than a decade ago. And more to the point, a person’s name must be on the ballot for that person to be considered for induction by the electors.
Ed Brophy has done a wonderful job of building the International Boxing Hall of Fame from scratch and making it a go-to destination for boxing fans. But the induction process needs a makeover.
Thomas Hauser’s email address isthomashauserwriter@gmail.com. His next book –The Most Honest Sport: Two More Years Inside Boxing– will be published this month and is available for preorder. In 2019, Hauser was selected for boxing’s highest honor - induction into the International Boxing Hall of Fame.