A lot of articles this week have been bashing Floyd Mayweather, Jr. regarding his behavior. Blaming him for the the breakdown in negotiations with Manny Pacquiao's camp for the super-fight everyone wants to happen.
I say blame boxing, seriously. Hasn't anyone ever heard the story of the scorpion and the frog before?
Floyd's been playing this game now for several years. He been saying he wants to fight Manny Pacquiao since before the Pac-Man beat Oscar De La Hoya. Leaking information through his personal mouthpiece the Grand Rapids Press through his relatives.
A lot of Mayweather fans like to claim that the leaks from Money's relatives don't mean anything. If it doesn't come from Mayweather's mouth then he didn't say it.
I've always found this argument to be very disingenuous. Either Money is the shrewd puppeteer that controls everything, or he isn't.
You can't claim your man is a genius one minute, and a rube who can't control his minions the next.
Mayweather knows full well what his people say and it is true that he's been angling or at the very least making people believe he's been angling for a fight with Pacquiao for a long time.
The thing is, Money wants it on his own terms. He wants the edge.
Therein lies the rub. Money's best interest may not be in the best interest of boxing.
But since no one really controls boxing, there's nothing the sport can do about Mayweather's behavior.
Which is why boxing needs to have a legitimate worldwide sanctioning body.
If they did have a sanctioning body then there would be a drug testing policy that could be legitimately debated. There would be an inspector to check gloves and wraps.
There would be a mechanism for a retired fighter like Money May to come back and fight. Which would have meant Mayweather couldn't cherry-pick a fight against a much smaller man like he did with Juan Manuel Marquez.
That's where HBO screwed up. They were greedy and they hyped Mayweather's return fight against Juan Manuel Marquez and made it seem like a legit fight.
It wasn't. The fight was a setup from minute one and everyone in boxing knew it. There wasn't one serious boxing expert that didn't know Money May was going to beat Marquez. The fight was a joke.
But HBO and Golden Boy went along with it, thinking it would be a one time deal and then they could make the Pacquiao fight immediately afterwards. They did it because they were greedy.
Now they have nothing in the pipeline. Nothing coming up in the way of big fights and the bouts they do have are actually turning off the fans.
The powers that be put all their eggs in the Mayweather-Pacquiao basket and now it isn't going to happen. At least not this year.
My question is this. What will HBO, Arum and Golden Boy do when James Toney versus Randy Couture does better PPV business than any of the fights they put on?
That, my boxing friends, will most likely happen.
Toney versus Couture may be a freak show in some ways but at least it poses an interesting question. Can James knockout Couture before Randy gets him on the ground? That question alone get fans to fork out for the PPV.
Maybe not Mayweather-Mosley PPV bucks, but certainly a lot more than the Pac-Man versus Cotto or Margarito. Or any other fight on the current schedule.
Then Ross Greenburg will go back to Money and beg him to fight. Which is what Mayweather wants.
My question is whether casual fans will even care about a Mayweather-Pacquiao bout when it finally happens, or will they all be UFC fans by then?
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