‘BOXING is dying…’
‘The One is The Last Big Fight…’
‘Is this the fight to save boxing?’
We keep telling people every week that boxing is doing just fine, thank you very much.
But mainstream sports editors won’t listen and I’ve heard all of the above this week.
So Floyd Mayweather Jnr, sport’s king of kings and, funnily enough, a boxer, tells them this.
“When your highest paid athlete in the world is a boxer, the sport is doing a-okay. You’ve got to ask over 41 million people that, is this sport big?”
Floyd Mayweather’s referring to his guaranteed purse of $41.5million, of course, and his status as sport’s biggest earner.
The CEO of Mayweather Promotions, Leonard Ellerbe, shakes his head at the claims with a grin.
“It comes from a lack of education about the business side of the sport,” he says. “Any time you generate record amounts of revenue, how can it be a dying sport?
“That’s what we’re talking about when we’re talking about speaking positively. We have so many entities out there who always want to tear the sport down and if you speak of these kind of things and these kind of events that are record-breaking events, hopefully boxing will one day become a mainstream sport again.”
Floyd has crossed into the mainstream by himself, of course, and put this fight ? The One ? firmly in the limelight.
Yet today, after the press conference, he looks a little tired and says he wants to go to bed.
“You know I’m not a morning person,” he smiles.
But he answers questions on the matter at hand, mostly about a 23-year-old called Saul ‘Canelo’ Alvarez.
He constantly jibed at Alvarez having to make weight [Floyd said he was weighing around 150lbs, 2lbs under the agreed catchweight] and when asked about the Mexican’s power, he simply replied: “Who’s going to be there for him to hit with this power?
“A stationery target? I’m not [Josesito] Lopez.”
Then he took a closer look at Alvarez’s record.
“I look at it as has he faced the same kind of fighters [Juan Manuel] Marquez faced?” he asks. “Has he fought the same calibre of fighters [Miguel] Cotto fought? I look at it like that. He’s solid but he’s no Floyd Mayweather. He knows he’s facing the truth.
“I mean, I’m just trying to find out, you fight Miguel Cotto’s brother but you don’t fight Miguel Cotto. You fight Ricky Hatton’s brother but you don’t fight Ricky Hatton. When I fought Ricky Hatton he was undefeated and I didn’t let him go the distance. When I fought Shane Mosley I did so after his biggest victory, against Antonio Margarito in 2009. He was world champion, WBA champion… These are things I’ve done in the sport.”
Floyd says he is a fan of basketball and football, but not boxing ? even though he seems to reluctantly love being involved in it and plans to keep working in boxing when he hangs the gloves up [“I know the sport of boxing, I’ve done this my whole life. It’s all I’ve ever done”].
He said he had not heard of Austin Trout until the Alvarez fight in Texas and is using the age old mind games of getting the young fighter to question his own pedigree.
“A lot of people said this fight wasn’t going to happen but I’d said let’s take one fight at a time,” Mayweather explains. “I had to get through Robert Guerrero first and once I got past him then I sat down with my team, Leonard, Al [Haymon] and we strategised the next move and it had to make a lot of sense. And it did.”
Is he set to run out of opponents before he retires?
“No,” he chuckles. “I’m Floyd Mayweather. I’m happy to turn anyone into a star. I don’t worry about that.”
“Not at all,” Ellerbe adds. “Floyd continues to elevate themselves and he’s gets bigger and bigger and more and more people want to see him lose.”
The conversation goes back to Floyd.
“I’m still where I’m at because I didn’t treat my body badly. I didn’t disrespect my body. I ate healthy, I eat some junk food but I try to have a solid meal every day. I stay working out and going to the gym. And there’s no drugs or alcohol. I never abused my body, that’s why I am where I am today and I’m still going strong at 36.”
He said he might fight in May and September again next year, and he reiterated his desire to box in the UK.
He’s looking older these days, but sounding spritely.
There’s gleam in his eye that still flickers with ambition, which is incredible given his enormous wealth.
“I’m making a lot more than 41.5,” he goes on, talking about his wages for Saturday night. “I’ve got the potential to make more than a hundred [million] this fight. It’s really not about the money because you get to a level where you can’t really buy anything anymore. The best car you can probably get is a Bugatti. My house is 22,000 sq feet. I’ve got another one that is 12,000 square feet. I’ve got homes in different places. I just want to continue to test myself against the guys they say are the best. And some day Canelo’s going to go down in the Hall of Fame, as one of the opponents I beat.”
Floyd reckons his ability to adapt in a fight could be the difference, and returned to his way of elevating himself above his opponent.
“If he is that good I’m just going to have to make another adjustment,” he states. “Robert Guerrero said he was going to beat me up, they always say they’ve got the best trainer… I went against Freddie Roach before.. all the so called best trainers went up against me and they lost so it’s obvious I got the best trainers.
“Even my trainers, if I come back and they tell me they see something that’s not working, I’m not going to do it because it’s different. What you see on the outside, it’s totally different inside.
“It’s just regular to me,” he continues, of how Vegas has come alive for fight week. “It’s just another fight. He’s just another opponent to me. I think I get stronger as the fight goes on. I’m a 15-round fighter. Someone said I’m the last of a dying breed.”
Perhaps Floyd is the last of ‘a dying breed’ but he is so in a sport that is very much thriving.
