McGregor wants $100M for Mayweather fight

By Boxing News - 05/22/2016 - Comments

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By Jeff Aranow: Floyd Mayweather Jr. is going to have to either look for another opponent for his next fight or he’ll need to take a much smaller payday than the one he’d like to take. Mayweather says his asking price is $100 million for his next fight, and he’s not been shy about saying he’d like to fight UFC star Conor McGregor. However, for Mayweather to get the $100 million that he wants for his next fight, McGregor would need to take a much smaller payday despite him supplying many of his loyal fans from his MMA sport.

McGregor says he also wants $100 million. This means that Mayweather would need to take a considerable pay cut from nine-figures that he wants for his fights because it won’t be possible for him and the 27-year-old McGregor to both get nine figures.

This fight could turn out to be a huge loss for whatever network is willing to guarantee Mayweather and McGregor huge paydays. McGregor is not known in the boxing community well enough to attract a lot of fans. The video of McGregor’s recent sparring workout with boxer Chris Van Heerden has already been seen by many boxing fans on YouTube and McGregor looked clueless in that sparring session. McGregor was out-boxed by Van Heerden, and he made him look like a world champion instead of a former IBO titleholder.

“He’s talking $100 million, I’m also talking $100 million,” said McGregor to the latimes.com. “He’s getting old now. I have the size, I have the reach, I have the height, I have the youth. He needs me. I don’t need him. That’s the truth of it. Who else can he fight? He fights someone else in the boxing realm, all of a sudden the pay goes from $100 million to $15 million, so if he wants to talk, we can talk, but it’s me who’s in control here.”

Mayweather would obviously get more than $15 million if he fought someone else instead of McGregor. He just wouldn’t get $100 million like he wants. For Mayweather to get $100 million by facing a boxing guy, he would likely need to face either Gennady Golovkin or Manny Pacquiao.

Even in those fights, it’s likely that there wouldn’t be enough revenue from PPV buys for the cable networks to keep from taking a loss. Pacquiao is retired and now a senator in the Philippines. It might take a lot of arm-twisting to get him to come back for a second Mayweather fight. Even then, it might be seen as a money grab by boxing fans if all Pacquiao is going to do is take the Mayweather fight. It might not generate the same numbers or even half the numbers of the first fight. It’s likely that many boxing fans are still upset at the high prices and the poor fight they got from the previous Mayweather-Pacquiao fight in 2015.

Neither fighter looked particularly interested in putting a great effort in their fight of the century, and the undercard that was packaged with the fight was woeful. I saw it as the equivalent of viewers paying to go to a high priced restaurant in hopes for a good meal and getting stuck with a fast food medal of greasy hamburgers and French fries.

If Mayweather wants to fight McGregor, he’s going to need to likely bring down his asking price from $100 million to something far less than that for the fight to be doable. If McGregor wants an equal payday with Mayweather, then the fight likely won’t be doable because Mayweather will need the much bigger slice of the revenue for him to get his nine figure payday. However, it’s still doubtful whether the fight would be a success because McGregor is a new name for the boxing community. you’re not going to get enough fans on board with an unknown as an opponent for them to want to pay to see the fight.

Anyone with common sense knows that an MMA fighter would stand no chance in a boxing ring against a top fighter. MMA fighters are more into submission holds and wrestling. They can’t fight well on their feet compared to boxers, which is why they’re doing MMA rather than boxing. Boxing fans are going to know that McGregor would have no chance against Mayweather, and they’ll likely stay away from that mismatch rather than spending whatever the asking price is for it on PPV.

If McGregor could first prove himself by fighting one of the top welterweights like Keith Thurman or Kell Brook, it might work for a later fight against Mayweather. However, the odds of McGregor beating Thurman or Brook would be embarrassingly low. The chances are McGregor would be knocked out by both fighters. McGregor looked truly awful against Van Heerden. McGregor likely would never agree to fight a top welterweight to prove himself to the boxing fans before a Mayweather fight. The fight fans would have to pay to see Mayweather fight a novice with a 0-0 record in a boxing ring. It would be a fight that be sure to anger fans after McGregor is badly schooled by Mayweather, who likely would stay in 1st gear for the entire fight intentionally so as not to anger fans by one-sided the fight turned out to be. It would likely be far worse than the Mayweather vs. Andre Berto mismatch was. At least Berto knows how to fight in a boxing ring. McGregor has zero boxing skills and it would take too many years for him to learn them.

The idea of Mayweather fighting a fighter from another sport like McGregor is due to the fighter bringing in a lot of PPV buys for his last fight against Nate Diaz last March. The fight brought in 1.5 million PPV buys. There’s no one in the sport of boxing for Mayweather to fight right now to bring in those numbers. Mayweather would be an opportunist if he were to fight McGregor.A fight between Mayweather and McGregor would work if the price were dropped to a more affordable rate due to the fight being a mismatch on paper. If they change the rules to give McGregor a handicap by saying Mayweather can’t use his right hand, then maybe the fiught will be fair. Without a handicap, McGregor doesn’t stand a chance against Mayweather. He doesn’t stand a chance even against 2nd tier fighter Van Heerden in my view. In their sparring session, McGregor fought like he had two left feet and it was embarrassing to watch. He might be a good wrestler but he’s awful on his feet fighting as a boxer. He looked clumsy, uncoordinated and totally unskilled.