By Robert Elmore: There seems to be a lot of uneducated people on these blogs and websites about Floyd Mayweather Jr. Judging by the comments, most of the fans are new comers to boxing or they are just band wagoners looking to hate on Floyd because he is running boxing right now. There seems to be this myth that Floyd ducked certain fighters.
Let me say this. He can’t fight everybody, although his critics want him to fight everybody. I will provide you with facts and where you (the reader) can go and retrieve the info for yourselves. Before I get started I want to point out this fact. No matter how many sources I provide, the hate still won’t stop. The first myth is that he ducked Antonio Margarito and Miguel Cotto while all three were on Top Rank. Here’s where I got my facts from. Go to Google and type in “Mayweather turns down 8 million to fight Margarito”. It was written by Dan Rafael in 2006.
A match indeed was set to take place on pay per view on August 12th 2006. Bob Arum CEO of Top Rank said that Mayweather had no problem fighting Margarito for the 8 million. This is where the problem came in. Floyd wanted a guaranteed purse of 10 million to fight Miguel Cotto and Ricky Hatton. Wait! Miguel Cotto? The same Miguel Cotto that had just beaten Carlos Maussa and was also ringside for the Floyd-Arturo Gatti fight and undefeated? Yes that Cotto.
Let’s continue. Arum was only willing to guarantee Floyd 7 million for those fights. That would be going backwards wouldn’t it? He was going to fight for 8 million then 7 against Cotto in a fight that would probably would have produced a good pay per view buys and brought good cash domestically? In addition to Floyd’s 10 million dollar request, he wanted 20 million to fight Oscar De La Hoya. Arum was not interested in doing the fight and here’s the response he gave.
“That’s not in the cards,” Arum said. “He wants $20 million for the De La Hoya fight? It’s not there. Sometimes, my man, you gotta know when to hold ’em and when to fold ’em. We’ll talk about things down the road.” Arum also said this about the De La Hoya fight. “I don’t want to, because if I did that fight, I would be working for such a small percentage, it’s not worth it,” he said. Oscar’s last fight on Top Rank was in 2004 against Bernard Hopkins and there was nasty feud between Arum and Oscar brewing that started back in February of 2000 when Oscar was trying to get out of his contract with Top Rank. (Google search Oscar De La Hoya; you’ll find this info under the section titled “De La Hoya vs Mosley 1).
But why wasn’t Arum willing to give Floyd the cash he was asking to fight Cotto, Hatton or De La Hoya? De La Hoya and Hatton I could understand, but Margarito and Cotto? This is what led Floyd to buy out his contract for 750,000 and take control of his own career.
Floyd would take on Carlos Baldomir for the lineal welter weight title and 8 million and 1 dollar. This was Floyd’s career best purse. So Arum told Floyd that the money wasn’t there for the De La Hoya fight? Here are some facts and where you can find this info. Floyd’s base purse was 10 million.
The fight broke all pay per view records in buys, gate, and domestic revenue. Oscar took home 52 million big ones while Floyd nabbed 25 million (Wiki Oscar De La Hoya vs Floyd Mayweather). So not only did Floyd get his 20 mill he was asking for he got 5 million more. The ten million he asked for to fight Cotto, he got that in and a whole lot more. Mayweather’s base purse for the fight was a record breaking 32 million smackers. The fight was the second highest grossing non heavyweight fight in pay per view history with 1.5 million buys. Floyd banked more than 40 million for that fight. Now I’m going to show something and provide facts. That same 7 million Arum tried to give Floyd for his fight against Cotto, he gave to Manny Pacquiao in his 2009 fight with Cotto. Manny’s base purse was 7.4 million. He also made the same amount against De La Hoya. These were given by the Nevada State Athletic Commission who must publicly display fighter’s purses.
Here are some more facts that probably won’t be researched either. Floyd called out a slew of fighters on his way to the top. He called Prince Nassem Hamed after the Diego Corrales fight. “Larry Merchant told Floyd, “Prince Nassem aint gonna fight you. After seeing this it aint gonna happen”. Floyd also said he hope he can fight the winner of the Casamayor-Freitas fight. He said after his victory over Jesus Chavez that he was looking forward to moving to 135 and fight Paul Spadafora, Jose Luis Castillo, and hopefully moving to 140 and fighting Kostya Tszyu. He also called out Juan Lazcano and Stevie Johnston. After his fight with Henry Bruseles at 140, Floyd once again called out Kostya Tszyu, he also added Shane Mosley and Oscar De La Hoya to the list. Here is the info on Floyd calling out these fighters (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HhIB8be86w4).
Now neither Lazcano, Cassamayor, Freutes, Tszyu, or Johnston responded to Floyd’s challenge. Now I have given much info to support my fact. However, as I have said before, most critics will not….will not…will not look this stuff up because the truth will hurt a lot of feelings;especially the facts about Floyd asking to fight Cotto. I’ve done my part. Do yours. Research. If anyone finds any hard facts about your claims, give them to me and I’ll research them.
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