Team Bradley to Turkey: Create a boxing commissioner to oversee the sport

Tim Bradley got on his soapbox this week to lecture Turki Al-Sheikh, telling him he’s done nothing to improve boxing other than make some “good fights”. The team feels that once Turki leaves the sport, things will be just as bad as before his arrival.

Commissioner Callout

Bradley says he wants Turki to create a commissioner-like person who “oversees” the sport in the same way the NFL and NBA do. Those leagues have appointed commissioners who oversee the management and travel of the teams.

It is unclear whether Turki would want to take on that kind of responsibility, as it would be a huge effort. He seems more interested in good fights between the fighters he chooses. It would be a full-time job for Turki to become a boxing commissioner if he could make it happen.

“Why don’t you help us build a union so the fighters can be strong and get their own promoter or whatever,” Tim Bradley said on social media, lecturing Turki Al-Sheikh. “Why don’t you give us the World Boxing Council, someone who looks at the whole (sport)?” I know we have VBC, but you know what I mean.

“Someone to oversee like the NFL (i.e. the sports governing commissioner, appointed by the teams in the league) and the NBA (a commissioner, similar to the NFL, appointed by the teams).

“You can have a headquarters in America, and you can have a headquarters there (Saudi Arabia), and they can all work together to put boxing back together the right way.” You do things like that, then you get my attention. You do things like that, then I’m behind you.

“I’ll be behind you, Turki, for real, because that’s what boxing really needs. When you’re gone, Turki, when you decide to go, we’ll go back to the beginning. You made some great fights (eg Fury vs. Usyk & Beterbiev vs. Bivol), but boxing didn’t change anything. You haven’t changed s***.

We are fixing the future of boxing

“So my point of view on boxing is different from all of yours. You’ll get the fights you want, which is great. That’s fantastic, but it won’t solve all the problems boxing has. We need one governing body that looks at the whole sport,” Bradley said.

Tim Bradley says that if Turki REALLY wants to save boxing 🥊, he “should form a union for old and new fighters and have boxing under one governing body that rules the entire sport like the NBA and NFL.”

Turk is just putting a Band-Aid on the box-

🎥 @Timbradleijr #Boxing pic.twitter.com/IRDdpIgurH

— Pound4Pound (@Pound4our4Pound) January 17, 2025

In the past, promoters around the world put on a lot of expensive, low-quality cards, and much of the interest in boxing disappeared. Too many events were put behind the PPV paywall, preventing fans from seeing the fights unless they were willing to pay $70 to watch mostly mismatches.

Promoters made matters worse by always pairing their fighters with opponents who couldn’t win. This continues today, and we’ve even seen it on some of Turkey’s cards with promoters stacking undercards in fights with no competitive value.