Mayweather predicting knockout of McGregor

By Boxing News - 07/12/2017 - Comments

Image: Mayweather predicting knockout of McGregor

By Allan Fox: Floyd Mayweather Jr. is predicting that he’ll be knocking out UFC star Conor McGregor in their big PPV fight on August 26. Mayweather’s knockout prediction of McGregor isn’t saying a whole lot, in as much as he’s fighting a guy that is making a pro debut in boxing.

It doesn’t matter who the person is. If you’re fighting someone making their pro debut and you’ve got a record of 49-0, you’re going to knock that person out. If Mayweather can’t knockout McGregor, then he probably needs to go away and stay retired. I don’t know if Mayweather will do that. If he needs money badly to pay off his tax debts with the IRS, then this might not be the last we see of him.

To help drive up the PPV buys for the fight, Mayweather should try and keep predicting knockouts. The boxing and MMA fans need some kind of driving force to get them to wanting to pay the steep $89.99 to $99.99 asking price to order the fight on PPV. If Mayweather can make the boxing fans believe that there will be a knockout in this fight, then the fans might be more energized to pay to see the fight on PPV. Without Mayweather doing his part to get fans excited about the fight, it might not bring in as many PPV buys to break the record or buys set by Mayweather and Manny Pacquiao in 2015. That fight pulled in 4.6 million buys.

”I think he’s the Maidana-type…It’s going to basically be a toe-to-toe battle,” said Mayweather about McGregor.

Mayweather never fights in a toe-to-toe manner, never. He’s not going to fight like that against McGregor. Mayweather will stay on the outside, jab, hold and move around the ring for 12 rounds. Mayweather said he was going to make it exciting in his last fight against Andre Berto. A lot of boxing fans bought into what Mayweather’s promises to it exciting in the Berto fight, but they ended up being disappointed in watching a boring fight. If Mayweather’s track record for predictions about his fights being exciting and filled with toe to toe action was a true, he could get knowledgeable boxing fans to believe that. Sound bites like that only works for people not familiar with Mayweather.

McGregor is a counter puncher, not a Marcos Maidana slugger type of fighter. McGregor throws short, snappy punches that work in the UFC due to the light padding for the gloves in that sport. Those same short arm-punches are not going to work with boxing gloves. McGregor will need to put his body behind his shots for him to generate knockout power in the boxing ring against Maidana. McGregor won’t hurt Mayweather with his arm punches.

The knockout prediction for the 40-year-old Mayweather is a little bit unusual for him, as he’s normally just predicting that his fights will be action packed, which rarely are. Predicting a knockout is a rather ambitious thing for Mayweather. He’s not had a knockout since his sucker punch stoppage of Victor Ortiz in 2011. That was a 4th round knockout for Mayweather, who was 34 at the time. Mayweather knocked out Ricky Hatton in true sense of the word in 2007. That was 10 years ago.

“Everyone knows I’ve never backed down from anybody. You line them up, and I knock them down like bowling pins. On August 26, I’m knocking Conor out,” said Mayweather.

Mayweather did back down from a fight against Gennady “GGG” Golovkin when he called him out on more than one occasion. Mayweather never fought Antonio Margarito, Paul Williams and Keith Thurman when those fighters called him out. Mayweather might not want to call it backing down, but when you choose not to fight top level fighters that are calling you out, and then I think you can call it backing down.

“I am guaranteeing you this. You are going out on your face or on your back. So which way do you want to go? said Mayweather.

For many boxing fans, they’re already used to Mayweather predicting that his fights will be action packed, and then they fail to live up to expectations. We heard how Mayweather was going to make his fights excting against Manny Pacquiao, Andre Berto and Robert Guerrero. None of those fights were exciting to watch. I got the impression that Mayweather wanted to turn over a new leaf and make it exciting for the boxing public in his fight with Berto, but he just couldn’t do it.

Mayweather’s safety first fighting style is so well ingrained with him that he couldn’t break his pattern. He slipped right back into his normal way of fighting the same way one would put on an old pair of slippers. I don’t think Mayweather can change that aspect of his game at this point in his career. When Mayweather was younger and more adaptable, he could switch on from being a play it safe fighter to being a slugger, but that was many years ago. We’re talking at least 11 years. Since 2006, Mayweather has adopted a safety first style, and he’s been stuck with that style of fighting. It works for him, but it can be so boring to watch. It’s not like watching an exciting fighter like Gennady Golovkin. Mayweather is the opposite of exciting in the ring. He’s very conservative with his fighting style. He’ll jab, hold and move.

Mayweather will need to do more than just jabbing and throwing single power shots for him to knockout McGregor. Mayweather can probably get a knockout in this fight if he throws combinations like he did in his knockout win over Diego Corrales many years ago in 2001 in the super featherweight division. That was a much younger Mayweather though, and he was fighting in the right division for his body size. After Mayweather moved up to welterweight, he’s been careful inside the ring to make sure he doesn’t get hurt.

“It takes two warriors to bring an event like this together. The two biggest forces in combat sports made this happen,” said Mayweather.

Mayweather and McGregor are the most popular fighters in their two sports, but they’re not biggest forces. They might not even be the best in their sports at this point. McGregor has been out of action for close to a year, and it’s been 2 years since Mayweather last fought. It’s been longer than that since Mayweather had a real fight. You can’t count Andre Berto as being a real fight, and nor can you count an injured Manny Pacquiao, who Mayweather beat in 2015. You got to go back to 2014 for Mayweather’s last real fight against a guy that was coming to take his head off in Marcos Maidana.

Mayweather ran around the ring for 12 rounds to beat Maidana in their rematch in September 2014. It was not a thrilling fight to watch due to Mayweather’s movement and holding he did to nullify Maidana’s offense. The last time Mayweather was involved in an exciting fight was in his first fight with Maidana in May 2014. That was a fight in which Mayweather fought with his back against the ropes for the first 6 rounds, and really struggled with that style. In the second half of the fight, Mayweather go on his bike and started moving in order to get the victory. He might have lost the fight to Maidana if he didn’t get on his bike, as he was getting out-punched by the Argentinian fighter. Mayweather had to start using his boxing skills for him to get the win in that fight. But the first 5 to 6 rounds was fun to watch. The last 6 was Mayweather fighting with his usual play it safe style.

“This was something that the fans wanted to see. I spoke to my team and said that the Mayweather-McGregor fight can be the biggest fight in history. That’s what we’re here to turn into reality. The best must fight the best. The fans wanted this fight,” said Mayweather.