• Mayweather’s hand problems make it difficult to KO McGregor
• It’s tough for Mayweather to knockout elite fighters
• Mayweather wants to knockout McGregor to entertain fans
• Fans expect a knockout
Mayweather promotions CEO Leonard Ellerbe wants Floyd Mayweather Jr. to do a job on Conor McGregor by knocking him out on August 26. Ellerbe hopes that Mayweather can entertain the boxing fans that will be coming to see the fight and purchasing it on Showtime PPV.
The fight is thought to be a big enough one for it to break the pay-per-view record by bringing in over 4.6 million buys. If the fight can bring in that many PPV buys, then Mayweather and McGregor certainly owe it to the boxing and MMA fans to make the fight as entertaining as possible, even if it means putting their chins on the line. The fans want that kind of fight from Mayweather, but will they get it?
It’s pretty much a long-shot at this point that a 40-year-old millionaire, who has been away from boxing for 2 years, is going to be able to knockout a bigger guy like McGregor. It’s a fight that Mayweather SHOULD be able to score a knockout. After all, McGregor is a novice fighting what was once the best fighter in boxing.
Mayweather is not the best any longer. You can’t call yourself the best when you’ve been out of the ring for 2 years, and it’s been ages since you took on a real change against a guy that could potentially beat you. Mayweather is not interested in fighting the best, which is why he’s not the best. McGregor has a chance in his fight to beat pull off an upset, especially if Mayweather tries to please the boxing fans by shooting for a knockout to please them.
Can Mayweather knockout an elite fighter at this point?
There are a lot of fans that will be expecting a lot from Mayweather and McGregor. The best way to give the fans what they want to see is to provide them with a knockout. The pay-per-view for the Mayweather-McGregor fight will be going for $89 to $99. That’s a lot of money for the average fan to pay out on top of their regular cable bill, which in some cases includes internet and phone. We’re talking about a bill that could wind up over $200 for the month if they order the Mayweather vs. McGregor fight.
”Expectations are going to be very high. The way to satisfy expectations in this situation is with a knockout,” said Ellerbe via the Everlast podcast “TALKBOX” at RingTV.com. ”So, the side of me that wants the fans to be happy wants the sport as a whole to succeed. I think that’s kind of what I’m hoping for.”
If Mayweather and McGregor have an idea in the back of their minds to meet up for a second fight in the octagon under UFC rules, then they’re going to need to give the boxing fans a great show on Aug.26. They will need to at least make it an entertaining fight from start to finish. Mayweather didn’t produce that in his fight against Manny Pacquiao two years ago in their fight of the century in 2015. If this really is the final fight of Mayweather’s career, then he doesn’t need to do anything for the boxing fans. He can fight as he always does by jabbing, moving and holding for 12 rounds.
If the fans are angry about the lack of action, then they only have themselves to blame for not doing research on Mayweather’s past fights, because he always fights the same way. The days that Mayweather would look to open up with his power shots to go for a knockout are long gone in the past. Mayweather hasn’t knocked anyone out since his sucker punch KO of Victor Ortiz in 2011. If not for Mayweather taking advantage over Ortiz when he has his hands down by his sides, he probably wouldn’t have knocked him out.
Does Mayweather have healthy enough hands to KO McGregor?
Mayweather has had hand problems for most of his career. Even back in 2002, when Mayweather was battling Jose Luis Castillo to a standstill, he was dealing with hand problems. Mayweather couldn’t sit down on his shots, which made his fights against the best fighters harder than they should have been. Castillo fought well enough to deserve victories in both of his fights with Mayweather. The fights might have been different had Mayweather been able to throw with major power.
It’s been no secret that Floyd has had hand problems throughout his career,” said Ellerbe. “It’s gotten a little better late in his career.”
Mayweather’s hands might have gotten better in recent years, but his knockouts haven’t materialized. With only 2 knockouts in his last 14 fights, Mayweather’s chances of knocking out McGregor are likely very low unless he comes out of character and takes some risks by throwing sustained combinations. Mayweather isn’t going to knockout McGregor with his light punches. Mayweather is probably not going to knock McGregor out with a jab, which is pretty much the only thing Mayweather throws. He’ll throw a pot shot while leaning backwards. There’s no power in the shot because he’s not a big puncher and he’s partially leaning backwards when he throws it. Mayweather isn’t going to knockout McGregor with a shot like that. I think it’s safe to say that Mayweather’s days of knocking anyone out are over with. They’ve picked out a novice for Mayweather to fight, but I don’t think he’s going to KO McGregor. If he wants to knockout someone, Mayweather will need to find someone else that isn’t very good.
It’s difficult for Mayweather to knockout bigger guys
Ellerbe says Mayweather has a hard time knocking out the bigger fighters. Mayweather hasn’t knocked out even the smaller guys. Manny Pacquiao wasn’t a bigger guy, and Mayweather couldn’t knock him out. Andre Berto wasn’t a bigger guy, and Mayweather never came close to knocking him out.
These are the fighters that Mayweather has failed to knockout in the last 11 years:
– Zab Judah
– Carlos Baldomir
– Oscar De La Hoya
– Juan Manuel Marquez
– Shane Mosley
– Miguel Cotto
– Robert Guerrero
– Saul Alvarez
– Marcos Maidana
– Manny Pacquiao
– Andre Berto
Of that list, Mayweather was bigger than Judah, Marquez and Pacquiao. He didn’t knock those guys out. I think it’s a waste of time for Ellerbe to be talking about Mayweather trying to knock McGregor out. I don’t think it’s going to happen. I know it sounds good for Ellerbe to be talking about Mayweather wanting to get a knockout, because that might get a few more boxing and MMA fans to purchase the fight on Showtime PPV. When they hear Ellerbe talking knockout, they probably are going to want to order the Mayweather-McGregor fight.
The problem is when Mayweather fails to back up his bold talk by going out and knocking McGregor out on August 26, there will be a ton of upset fans. Mayweather was saying that his fights against Berto and Pacquiao would be action packed. Mayweather even said he was going to go for a knockout of Berto. If you saw that fight, you’ll have noticed that Mayweather just toyed with Berto for the entire bout, treating the contest like a sparring exhibition instead of a fight in which he was trying to entertain the fans. The reality is that Mayweather’s problems with knocking guys out has nothing to do with him fighting bigger guys, because he’s not been knocking out the smaller guys.
The No.1 reason why Mayweather isn’t knocking fighters out is because he doesn’t have the mindset to knock guys out. To score knockouts, Mayweather would need to take risks with his own health. Look at Gennady Golovkin. He knocked out every opponent from 2008 until his streak stopped earlier this year in 2017. The reason Golovkin was able to knockout so many guys is because he was going after his opponents and he was willing to risk getting hit by them.
You don’t knock guys out unless you put your chin on the line. That’s the way it is. Mayweather hasn’t been willing to do that in the last 11 years of his career. I don’t think that’s going to change because he’s fighting McGregor. As soon as McGregor hits Mayweather with something that is powerful, Mayweather is going to decide right away that it’s not worth it for him to take a chance. At his point, I think the survival mechanism is so ingrained with Mayweather that he won’t even try to get the knockout. I see it as lip service with Mayweather and Ellerbe. They talk big, but they won’t back it up by trying to actually get the knockout.
Mayweather, 40, might not want to get McGregor out of there. After all, the man is one of the biggest stars in the UFC. Mayweather destroying McGregor would be embarrassing him to a certain extent. McGregor is fighting out of his sport, and he doesn’t know a lot about boxing at this point. He’s getting a lot of raining now for this training camp, but he hasn’t been doing it his entire life since he was 5-years-old like Mayweather.
“It’s harder to knock out bigger guys. It’s hard to knock out guys, elite guys. I know Floyd’s looking to knock him out. Floyd is definitely going into this fight looking to knock Conor out. He wants to get this guy out of there; he definitely wants to stop Conor McGregor.”
If there’s going to be a knockout in this fight, it might be McGregor being the one that gets it. That doesn’t mean he’s got the same kind of boxing skills as Mayweather. McGregor is more active, and he’s bigger and stronger than Mayweather. For a fighter like Mayweather to sit out of the ring for 2 years, blowing millions on leisure activities, it’s going to be very hard for him to beat a guy in the zenith of his career like McGregor. Coming off the layoff is going to be hard enough for Mayweather to deal with. What people don’t quite understand about Mayweather is the fact that he hasn’t had a real fight since his first fight against Marcos Maidana in 2014. That was 3 years ago. In the rematch, Mayweather ran from Maidana for 12 rounds. That wasn’t even a fight. That was a track meet and it wasn’t worth watching. Mayweather’s fight against Pacquiao came against an injured and over-the-hill fighter.
Pacquiao had a bum shoulder going into the fight. There was nothing impressive abut Mayweather beating an injured Pacquiao. Mayweather’s last fight against Andre Berto was nothing special. Berto wasn’t one of the best in the welterweight division. Mayweather picked him out from the pack, selecting a beatable guy that had been easily beaten by Robert Guerrero. Mayweather might as well have signed Guerrero for a rematch in 2015, because that would have been far more interesting than watching Mayweather toy with Berto for 12 rounds.
If Mayweather wants to knockout McGregor 29, then he needs to open up with his power shots and throw some combinations for a change. Mayweather hasn’t thrown any combinations for a long, long time. He mostly throws one punch at a time, as he tries not to get countered. Throwing one punch at a time is Mayweather’s style, and he’s not going to change that.
Mayweather needs to focus on entertaining
If Mayweather boxes McGregor like I think he will, the fight is going to be boring to watch on August 26. The only way it won’t be boring is if the two of them stand in the center of the ring and throw big power shots. If McGregor can land anything it all, the boxing fans are going to be happy, because the fight is seen as a big mismatch. McGregor being able to land a handful of punches in each round might make it worthwhile for the boxing fans that have plunked down $99 to see the fight on PPV.
Mayweather doesn’t need to let McGregor hit him, but he can still make it exciting by opening up with his offense by throwing combinations. Earlier in Mayweather’s career, he was willing to throw combos in his fights, and he was exciting to watch. Around 10 years ago, Mayweather changed his style and become a safety first fighter, and the knockouts dried up completely. I don’t think Mayweather can change who he is at this point in his career. He’s like Wladimir Klitschko. If you look at Klitschko, he fights in a safety first style, and it cost him his last fight against Anthony Joshua. Wladimir could have won the fight if he’d opened up with his punches after hurting Joshua in the 6th. Instead of doing that, Wladimir played it safe, let Joshua off the hook, and ended up getting knocked out by him in the 11th.