By Jerrod Green: Okay first off I do not want to come off as a Floyd Mayweather Jr. fanatic who doesn’t care about anyone or anything else in the sport of boxing. However I find it quite insane at the amount of hate Floyd gets. First off the man has been undefeated for 17 years. He has fought world class champions and contenders of all sorts, but somehow it is overlooked.
Take Oscar De la Hoya, Shane Mosley, Ricky Hatton, Miguel Cotto and Juan Manuel Marquez for example. For some odd reason Manny always gets more credit for fighting them even though Mayweather fought 3 of them first and arguably say he looked better doing it, but that is of opinion depending on you ask.
Also Mayweather constantly is fighting new opponents, guys that are younger than him and also guys that are coming off wins, so I don’t understand this “cherry picker” concept. Not to down Pacquiao, but he has given us some of the same recycled fights and drained them considerably. When Floyd does decides to take on a fighter people say “this is the one that will beat him” and then when they lose it becomes “he was too small or Floyd knew he could beat him”…what? And then people began to slander him with racist comments, women beater or stuff like he ducked Pacquiao.
Now lets be fair; they are both at fault as Bob Arum made up excuses, the RBT fiasco and the disagreement over the purse split, but the fight would’ve been in 2010 had it not been for Pacquiao refusing the RBT cutoff of 14 days, see here http://sports.yahoo.com/news/boxing–floyd-mayweather-and-manny-pacquiao-nearly-agreed-to-a-2010-fight.html. Floyd also doesn’t get enough credit for keeping the sport mainstream after Oscar De la Hoya retired.
Mayweather has helped create platforms like the 24/7 series and All-Access. He has constructed great business deals that other boxers can emulate such his deal with Showtime. He has done charitable acts such as passing out turkeys, helping the homeless, paying a sick girl’s medical bills and even paying for the late Genaro Hernandez’s funeral, but it goes unnoticed.
Bottom line is Floyd creates great attention for the sport, but has been treated poorly by various boxing sites and bloggers as well as TV affiliates. Sadly he probably won’t be appreciated until long after he has retired, much like Muhammad Ali.
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