The Cyber Boxing Zone Newswire

(Hamburg, 30 March 1999) We live in an era where almost as many different boxing sanctioning bodys exist as there are weightclasses. In every division the four main world boxing federations (WBC, WBA, IBF, WBO) have crowned their champions beside an unknown number of dubious further organizations.

But there is a procedure that allows to determine the single real world champion of every weightclass. This fighter is the successor of former great champions, who were holding a unified or then single title in an earlier era. This real world champion is called Linear Champion. In the light heavyweight division the Linear Champion is Dariusz Michalczewski.

The Lineage of the Light Heavyweight World Title:

• Michael Spinks reigned from 1981 to 1985, unifyed all titles (then only WBC+WBA) and eventualy vacated them.

[Lineage temporarily interrupted. Title is divided into two and the IBF is created additionaly.]

• Virgil Hill KO4 Leslie Stewart for WBA Title, September 1987
  Hill is accepted as the linear successor of Michael Spinks, because of his adjacent long string of title defenses (10) and because he won the crown against highly ranked Leslie Stewart, the conquerer of Marvin Johnson.
• Thomas Hearns W12 Virgil Hill for WBA Title, June 1991
• Iran Barkley W12 Thomas Hearns for WBA Title, March 1992
  Barkley vacates his WBA title. His next light heavyweight title fight comes against Maske.
• Henry Maske KO10 Iran Barkley for IBF Title, October 1994
  Maske comes out of 4 IBF defenses and makes 5 more after beating Barkley.
• Virgil Hill W12 Henry Maske for WBA+IBF Titles, November 1996
  Hill comes out of 9 straight WBA defenses before beating the undefeated Henry Maske, who comes out of 10 IBF defenses himself.
• Dariusz Michalczewski W12 Virgil Hill for WBA+IBF+WBO Titles, June 1997
  After beating Hill "The Tiger" relinquishes the WBA and IBF titles and they would be eventualy won by Lou del Valle (WBA), who gets beaten by Roy Jones, and William Guthrie (IBF), who gets beaten by Reggie Johnson.

On Saturday, 3 April, Dariusz Michalczewski, 39-0 (32 KO´s), will make the 15th defense of his WBO title along with the 6th defense of his LINEAR LIGHT HEAVYWEIGHT TITLE against Russian Muslim Biarslanov in Bremen.

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