Yep. "Best" is a lot more important and compelling than "best out of a group of people with the same handicap*"
* handicap in the golf sense, not in the physically disabled sense
Yes, a small guy won the first couple, because he mastered a style no one else knew. And it was fascinating to watch David topple Goliath with that special knowledge.
However, you're out of your mind if you think that would still happen today and an openweight tourney wouldn't be thoroughly dominated by HW/LHW.
They are the best fighters and other weights have their own special divisions, because they can't compete.
There is no substitute for being simply the best, period. Being the best considering you'd never stand a chance in the sport unless they make a special division where you can compete with people who are from the best and merely good considering their lack of physical ability to compete with the big men simply doesn't have the same prestige or public demand which is why football, basketball, baseball and hockey require everyone to compete without giving them weight classes to hide behind.
American football doesn't have special divisions for small guys. Horse racing doesn't have special divisions for big guys who want to be jockeys. That's because the vast majority of the pro sports world makes people understand that just because you might want to be a pro athlete, depending upon the sport, you might simply not be built to have any chance of competing. If that applies to someone, he needs to find some other way of earning himself a living. A real man can accept that fact. Not everybody is born with the gifts to be a pro athlete, in fact, very few are. Learn to live with it.
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