Floyd Mayweather Jr. enhanced his villainous image by the way he registered a fourth-round knockout of Victor Ortiz on Saturday night.
By striking the instant he was allowed to punch after referee Joe Cortez stopped action to deduct a point from Ortiz for a head butt, Mayweather landed a left hand to Ortiz’s face that stunned the welterweight champion from Ventura.
With Cortez and Ortiz caught off guard, Mayweather (42-0, 26 knockouts) then finished the fight with a devastating straight right hand to Ortiz’s jaw that sent the 24-year-old to la-la land.
“I spaced a bit,” said Ortiz, who asked Mayweather for a rematch, contending the punches were “not fair.”
Mayweather, 34, chalked up the ending to his advantage in experience, and expressed no remorse after the frustrated, beaten-to-the-punch Ortiz (29-3-2) bloodied Mayweather’s lip and mouth with the head butt.
“What goes around,” Mayweather said, “comes around.”
When HBO’s Larry Merchant tried to interview Mayweather after the fight, Mayweather suggested the 80-year-old boxing analyst talk to Ortiz “since you’ve never given me a fair shake.” Mayweather used an expletive and questioned Merchant’s knowledge of the sport, to which Merchant replied, “If I was 50 years younger, I’d kick your [rear].”
Mayweather didn’t exactly embrace Ortiz’s rematch request.
“If he feels it was a fluke, I’ll do the same thing again,” Mayweather said. “But he was slowly breaking down as each round went. He was going to go down, anyway.”
It’s more likely that Ortiz will end up as a participant in a welterweight tournament his promoter, Richard Schaefer, will propose to HBO and Showtime this week.
