By Sean McDaniel: Ricky Hatton (45-2, 32 KO’s) has been out action ever since he was stopped in the 2nd round last year in May by Manny Pacquiao. Since that time, Hatton hasn’t been able to get himself back on the horse to make a comeback. Hatton has ballooned up in weight and looks nothing like his former self. He talks about needing to get the hunger or the itch before he’s ready to stage a comeback. Currently, Hatton is 31, but he turns 32 in October and the longer he waits the more likely he’ll be too old or too fat to be able to successfully make a comeback.
However, Hatton has said that if he was to come back, he’d like to fight a rematch with Floyd Mayweather Jr., who stopped Hatton in the 10th round in December 2007. Oddly enough, Hatton was fairly competitive for the first six rounds of the fight despite the referee not allowing Hatton to do too much in fighting. In the second half of the fight, Mayweather pulled away and began to dominate and punish Hatton with short right hands and left hooks to the head.
From there, it was all Mayweather until he dropped Hatton in the 10th with a check left hook. Since Hatton doesn’t seem all that interested in fighting other guys like Amir Khan, Michael Katsidis or Timothy Bradley, would Hatton be interested in fighting a rematch with Mayweather if he asked Hatton? It’s not beyond the realm of possibilities because Mayweather has already failed in trying to put together a fight against Pacquiao last February. He could fail again if there’s something that Pacquiao doesn’t want to agree to.
In that case, Mayweather would need a big named opponent in order for him to get a nice payday, and who better than Ricky Hatton. No doubt it would be a lot better if Hatton stayed active after being stopped by Pacquiao. That doesn’t help things, but boxing fans, especially the casual variety, have short memories and they might not care if Hatton’s coming off a loss or not. They probably want to see the fight anyway.
If Mayweather would agree to fight Hatton in one of the large football stadiums in England, I think both would do well in selling it out. The fight would do well no matter where it took place. You could put Hatton-Mayweather on the moon and it would do well. That’s just the popularity of these two fighters. I can’t see Hatton turning Mayweather down if he offers a fight. Why should Hatton? He would likely get $10 million or more for the fight, and I’m sure Hatton could find a way for his hunger to be satisfied with that kind of money.
There’s also not as much shame for Hatton if he does wind up losing to Mayweather again. Hatton would have the excuse of the long layoff and the massive amount of weight that he was forced to take off to fight Mayweather. It isn’t like how Hatton would look if he was to be beaten by a young Brit like Amir Khan. I think Hatton wouldn’t like that one bit, but getting beaten by Mayweather is something different.
I think it would be worth Hatton’s while to take this fight if Mayweather offers it to him. Mayweather really doesn’t have a lot of options for popular opponents once you remove Pacquiao from the equation. There’s not a whole lot of fighters that Mayweather can get a huge payday against like Hatton and Pacquiao.
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