(Photo credit: Esther Lin/Showtime) By Gerardo Gomez: The Moment has arrived! Or has it? After yesterday’s weigh-in, where both fighters came below the welterweight limit, all the attention turned to “GlovesGate.” The issue at hand was that Maidana wanted to wear custom made Everlast gloves with the Argentinian flag colors and after inspecting those gloves, Leonard Ellerbe, the CEO of Mayweather Promotions, deemed that the gloves did not have the proper padding around the knuckle area and so those gloves were banned.
Team Maidana then countered that with wearing the Red Everlast MX gloves that were approved by the Nevada State Athletic Commission (NSAC) to which Team Mayweather rejected as well even though those gloves were approved by the NSAC. This “GlovesGate” scandal got so bad that Team Mayweather threaten to call the fight off if Team Maidana did not agree to fight with Grant gloves, same ones that Floyd will be using in his fight.
Robert Garcia’s, Maidana’s trainer countered by proposing both fighters with Everlast gloves. Marcos Maidana has never fought using Grant gloves and so the notion that Mayweather wants Maidana to wear gloves that he has never used in the most important fight of his career is ridiculous. So we wait for “the moment,” when this will be resolved. We wait for “the moment” when Mayweather realized his psychological tactics didn’t work. We wait for “the moment” when we can just focus our attention and enjoy a great night of boxing.
This fight is your typical boxer vs fighter fight. For the casual boxing fans, not all boxers are fighters the same way that not all fighters are boxers. For boxers, like Mayweather, they specialized winning their fights on points rather than getting inside a ring and engaging in wars. For fighters, like Maidana, they enter the ring with the mentality of going to war. These type of fighters are aggressive and they don’t care engaging in brawls because they find comfort in those type of fights. They may not be the most skilled and technical fighters but they are the most fan friendly fighters because they give what the fans want to see; a knockout or an all action packed fight.
With that being said, for Marcos Maidana to pull off the upset and win he has to put pressure on Mayweather and throw punches in bunches. A fighter like Mayweather cannot be allowed to think inside the ring. If you give him time to think his opponent has already lost the fight. Maidana has to cut the ring, pressure Mayweather, force Mayweather to fight and get him off his comfort zone which is trying to avoid fighting in the center of the ring. Maidana has to focus his attention on the body and not upstairs. That is not to say that he can’t throw combinations leading with the jab straight to the body then coming back with his over right/left hand hooks to the face. Maidana has to stay calm and throw punches in bunches. Of the 10 punches that he throws, maybe 4 land and of those 4 that land 2 might hurt. Mayweather is not easy to hit and because he is not easy to hit some fighters lose their patience and get side track and end up falling into Mayweather’s plan. The same way that a tree can’t fall down with one hack, Maidana has to try to pound Mayweather’s body hoping that those hard body shots in the later rounds will begin to chop away Floyd’s legs therefore taking advantage of that and couple with combinations of hooks upstairs and heavy body blows to the ribs, we may see Floyd in a situation that he has never been in. Maidana has the chance of knocking down Mayweather. Will it happen? I guess we will have to see if “the moment” comes. I won’t be surprised if it does the same way that I won’t be shock if Mayweather runs all night.
For Floyd to win he just has to do what he does best; hit and go. He has to continue to out jab his opponents, use his ring intelligence and make his opponent fight his fight. Mayweather will try to make the fight around the center of the ring, avoid putting himself on the ropes and just being conservative in his punches and increase the accuracy of those punches. One thing that Floyd doesn’t get credit with the most is his boxing IQ. The guy is a boxing genius. Mayweather has the ability to get an idea of the type of fighter he has in front of him and make those necessary adjustments throughout the fight. Mayweather’s greatest strength inside that ring is his mind. Give a man time to think and that man is powerful. So the more an opponent allows Floyd to think inside that ring, the more time he will have to provide that fighter with a Boxing Clinic. Boxers like Mayweather are dangerous when they are thinking and if Maidana is able to throw Mayweather off his game plan by consistently trying to find a way to get Maidana off of him or blocking the punches that are coming from different angles then it plays to Maidana’s advantage.
I don’t expect Mayweather to exchange with Maidana since that is not Floyd’s game and I don’t expect Maidana to try to outbox Floyd. The fighter who thinks they are going to beat Floyd by boxing must be out of his mind. I wont’ be surprised if Mayweather gets knock down in the later rounds the same way I won’t be shock if Mayweather gets on his bicycle and parades around the ring.
Mayweather will cruise to a unanimous decision with Maidana maybe winning 3-4 rounds the most. I won’t be surprised if Maidana ends up pulling the upset and if he does, it would be because he kept his patience, kept coming forward and kept pounding the body. Now wouldn’t that be a MOMENT to remember? Where were you when THE MOMENT came for Floyd’s 1st loss? Or when was THE MOMENT in the fight that you came to realize that Floyd’s fights are always the same and nothing changes, just the opponent?
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