The thing is, it takes some talent to be a real boxing judge, and there aren't enough of them to go around. So, you have punch-counters because just about anyone can count punches.

Not so. Of the fights I've watched on television so far, I've probably seen 100 great punches land without being counted. And I've seen several good boxers get robbed.

Maybe there ought to be a panel of real judges who review tapes of every fight and report back the real results within 24 hours--knockouts excepted.

Or maybe there ought to be electronic sensors implanted in the boxers' faces and torsos that register blows and do away with judges altogether.

I don't watch amateur boxing, except once every four years. But I do watch profession bouts fairly regularly. And when I turned on the TV the other day I didn't recognize what I was watching. I knew what the scoring system was supposed to be, and why, but it all looked rather foreign. Boxers flailing about wildly, almost wrestling, punches apparently landing but not scoring, standing eight counts for no obvious reason. Well, no reason to watch again for at least another four years.

I tried watching a little boxing since NBC seems to want us to watch it so bad. It is on seemingly 24 hours a day on the cable channels so you don't have much choice if you are not watching during live event time. Anyway the scoring is so non-sensical that I turned it off pretty quickly.

All of these judged sports have their problems. Perhaps there should be no judged sports. If you can put a clock on it, or count the goals scored...but then again look at sports with referees like the US soccer team getting knocked out thanks to a player being sent off in the 3rd minute of the match. Or the ridiculous penalty kick called in the NED-JPN match, and maybe that's not any better. I guess that leaves us with swimming, track & field, shooting, and maybe the racket/paddle sports.

King,

I know taekwondo doesn't get as much press (though maybe the Lopez siblings will change that), but the scoring is just as ridiculous. You'll see a flurry of kicks, and at the end of it, maybe one point scored. I've trained, competed, and "judged" in taekwondo tournaments, and the scoring can be just as arbitrary. At least there you get extra points for a head shot or a knockdown though. They are also moving towards electronic scoring, which I suppose would also make things fairer. But in all honesty, as much as I like the sport, it really isn't that interesting for non-taekwondoists to watch. Probably much like amateur boxing.