Pictured: Ruben Eduardo Acosta

It was announced today that South American and FAB Argentine super middleweight champion Ruben Eduardo Acosta will be substituting for the flu-stricken Edison Miranda as WBO champion Robert Stieglitz' challenger on Saturday, January 9. Acosta was referred to as the WBO's #11 ranked super middleweight contender. I didn't recall Acosta being ranked and checked to see if I was being forgetful. No, I wasn't. The WBO's super middleweight rankings for December 2009 as of the day they were posted December 11 did not include Acosta.

I then thought to myself that maybe the WBO had issued their January 2010 rankings a bit early. Again, I checked but they hadn't. However, they had changed their December 2009 super middleweight rankings to include Acosta and, ironically, to accomplish this, they quietly dropped former WBO champion Karoly Balzsay, who owns a win over Acosta, from their top 15.

Here are the WBO's December 2009 rankings as of December 11 (with the movements from the November 2009 rankings added):

WBO (as of December 2009; posted on the WBO's website December 11):

World Champion: Robert Stieglitz

1- Alexander Abraham
2- Eduard Gutknecht (Int-Cont) ( from #9)
3- Allan Green (NABO)
4- Paul Smith
5- Edison Miranda (NABO Interim) (up from #7)
6- Mikkel Kessler (new; had been WBA super champion)
7- Jean Paul Mendy (down from #6)
8- Kariz Kariuki (Oriental) (Asia-Pacific) (Africa) (up from #10)
9- Stas Kashtanov (up from #14)
10- Andre Dirrell (up from #11)
11- Curtis Stevens (up from #13)
12- Denis Inkin (down from #5)
13- Karoly Balzsay (down from #8)
14- Sakio Bika (up from #15)
15- Sebastien Demers (new)

Out from November 2009 rankings:
#2- Andre Ward (now WBA super champion)
#12- Dimitri Sartison (now WBA champion)

And here are the "adjusted" (or maybe "manipulated" might be more appropriate) December 2009 as they appear now (again with the movements added):

WBO (December 2009; as of January 4, 2010):

World Champion: Robert Stieglitz

1- Arthur Abraham
2- Eduard Gutknecht (Int-Cont)
3- Allan Green (NABO)
4- Paul Smith
5- Edison Miranda (NABO Interim)
6- Mikkel Kessler
7- Jean Paul Mendy
8- Kariz Kariuki (Oriental) (Asia-Pac) (Africa)
9- Stas Kashtanov
10- Andre Dirrell
11- Ruben Acosta (new)
12- Curtis Stevens (down from #11)
13- Denis Inkin (down from #12)
14- Sakio Bika
15- Sebastian Demers

Out from December 2009 rankings posted December 11:
#13- Karoly Balzsay

If an organization issues rankings once a month, shouldn't those rankings remain manipulation-free until the next month's rankings are compiled and posted? Slipping Acosta in so he could qualify as a substitute opponent certainly seems unethical but then when does ethics figure in when we're talking about boxing's four major sanctioning bodies?