[trowawee]

Boxing went from the most popular sport in the country to being a niche sport. A large part of that was a shrinking talent pool; parents who, in earlier times would have let their kids box prohibited them from doing so. Muhammad Ali's Parkinson's diagnosis was an eye-opener for a lot of people.

[scruple]

I'd argue that the largest factor in the decline of boxing has been the runaway success of MMA and companies like the UFC, Pride, etc...

[sls]

Not to argue that point necessarily, but there's been only the one success of significance, the UFC. Pride went out of business 10 years ago and the organization founded to replace it, Dream, went out of business only a few years later. (Pride ended up as a UFC acquisition, as did the WEC, but both of them were foundering and were picked up for their rights - access to fighters and video libraries).

[scruple]

That's very true. I mentioned Pride because it is still easily brand-recognizable to folks who are only vaguely familiar with the sport and because it came from the early days of MMA where it helped propel the sport to the mainstream.