Never short on words, former world champion and first class trainer Roger Mayweather sat down with me to discuss his nephew Floyd’s training camp for his upcoming fight with Victor Ortiz, as well as his thoughts on Manny Pacquiao. In one of the most anticipated fights of this year, Floyd Mayweather steps into the ring against WBC Welterweight Champion Victor Ortiz on September 17 at the MGM Grand in Las Vegas. Last Monday training camp began and with two weeks down Roger is confident that this camp will be one of Floyd’s best.
“Even though he has been off for awhile he is pretty sharp. He has boxed his a** off for 4 days. We still have a long time to get ready for this fight. The last couple of days in the gym he has boxed about 3 to 4 good sparring partners. He’s been working with Kassim Ouma. The more he boxes the better he gets. Floyd is going to be in top shape. He knows what he has got to do to get ready for Ortiz. The same thing he has done to get ready for all the other fights. Boxing is how you adapt, my nephew right now is still in the early part of training, but he is getting much better. His skills are getting much sharper. I think he is going to do what he needs to do and that’s win.”
Roger quickly wanted to address the fact that his nephew does not receive the credit he deserves in the media, especially the comparisons to Manny Pacquiao and the remarks about Floyd not being active enough.
“Everyone talks about his lay offs,” Roger said. “Look my nephew took 17 months off before he fought Mosley. He came back from retirement and beat Marquez easily. Look how good he looked against them, so that just tells you how good my nephew is. The only reason people always talk about Pacquiao and not Floyd is because he doesn’t stay active enough. There is no telling how good my nephew can be if he stayed active. Pacquiao and Floyd are two different fighters you cant compare them. One is better than the other and you know which one I’m f*****ng talking about. Pacquiao hasn’t lost for while but if he fought Floyd he would get his a** whooped.”
I began to think maybe it was a bad decision to interview Roger by the bar, as we were watching the Lamont Peterson-Victor Cayo bout at the Cosmopolitan, but he clearly wasn’t drinking as he ordered a cranberry juice and proceeded to talk more about Pacquiao. . “People say what they say, but they don’t know s**t about boxing. My nephew has too much skills for him. Pacquiao don’t want to fight Floyd no way. He cant say he is the best. In order to be the best, he has to beat the best and the best is my nephew.”
Switching back to the subject at hand, Victor Ortiz. I asked Roger if he and Floyd had anything particular that they would need to work on in training preparing for the Ortiz matchup. Roger didn’t hold back as he said “There is no blueprint on how to beat Floyd. There is a blueprint on how to beat Ortiz, he has already been beat before. It ain’t about Ortiz being beat, it’s about Floyd aint been beat. Ortiz has to find a blueprint on how to beat Floyd and there aint one.”
Roger’s prediction for Mayweather-Ortiz was short and to the point.
“My nephew got too much skills for him. Nobody really knows how this fight is going to go, but If I had to say, my nephew would probably beat him in a unanimous decision.”
