(Photo credit: Idris Erba) By Chris Williams: Floyd Mayweather Jr (46-0, 26 O’s) hinted this week that he may opt to continue to fight on after his remaining 3 fights of his 6-fight contract is through next year. Mayweather will be 49-0 at that time if he continues winning, and he says he’d be willing to stick around to pick up win No.50 if Showtime wants to offer him another contract.
Mayweather’s current deal is said to be a 6-fight, $200 million contract. But if Showtime wants to offer him some additional loot to keep him around for another contract, he says he’d be interested in that.
Mayweather said “If the price is right for number 50, then it’s possible. Everyone knows I have a certain deal [with Showtime/CBS], but if Stephen [Espinoza] gives me another deal.”
With Mayweather bringing in 850,000 to 2.2 million pay-per-view buys for his fights thus far with Showtime, they would be crazy not to try and keep him around for another contract.
Mayweather has done a lot to bring new subscribers to Showtime since they signed him to the 6-fight deal, and you can bet that he would continue to draw fans for a good time to come. Mayweather has access to some of the top fighters in the 140-154 pound divisions in Amir Khan, Danny Garcia, Keith Thurman, Lucas Matthysse, Saul “Canelo” Alvarez, Erislandy Lara, Shawn Porter and Miguel Cotto.
Those are 8 good fights right there. Mayweather will obviously exhaust two of those names after he gets done with his rematch against Marcos Maidana on September 13th. When Mayweather finishes his current contract with Showtime next year, he’ll still have 6 names for him to fight and possibly more.
Showtime vice president of Sports Stephen Espinoza is going to need to open up his piggy bank and dig deep if he wants to keep Mayweather around after he hits win number 49 next year, because if he loses Mayweather, then there’s no else that will be able to take his place as far as bringing in huge ratings and pay-per-view numbers.
Canelo thus far hasn’t shown that he can bring in more than 350,000 pay-per-view buys, and his career is looking murky after his disappointing and inconclusive win over Lara. Showtime needs someone that can get them through another 1-3 years of big ratings, and Mayweather would seem to be the only guy out there that can do that.
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