“I bring the most controversy to the sport. The others are too nice. This is a brutal sport. Somebody’s got to keep it up and running. Why not me?”
Floyd Mayweather Jr announced earlier this month that he had decided to return to the ring, much to the surprise of….well, nobody.
Pretty Boy has not fought since December, 2007, when he underlined his status as the then pound-for-pound number one with a tenth-round stoppage of Ricky Hatton in Las Vegas.
He announced that he was hanging up his gloves soon after the bout but few really believed him when he said he was finished for good. It was argued that the only thing that Mayweather loves more than his own reflection is money. It was always highly likely, therefore, that he would be tempted out of retirement.
So the announcement that he would be making a comeback, against Juan Manuel Marquez on July 18, with a view to an end-of-year showdown with Manny Pacquiao, hardly sent shockwaves throughout the boxing world. It had been coming.
He has returned, ostensibly, to ensure that he will be remembered as the finest fighter of his generation. However, it seems that ‘Money Mayweather’, as he likes to call himself, has, somewhat amusingly, returned because he has some financial worries – Floyd is rumoured to owe quite a bit of money to the IRS.
But should we welcome Mayweather back with open arms?
The Grand Rapids native is a deeply flawed character who is brash, arrogant, materialistic, disrespectful and, worst of all, occasionally violent. Violence and boxing are regular bedfellows, of course, but this is a man with previous criminal convictions for striking women.
Of course, one could use his turbulent (and that is putting it mildly) upbringing as something of an excuse for his past indiscretions. Floyd Mayweather Sr has never been in the running for any ‘Father of the Year’ awards!
Indeed, there are those that claim that Mayweather Jr has matured immeasurably in recent years and that his disagreeable public persona is a facade, a villainous image he created to make himself more marketable.
There could be some truth in this as Mayweather, despite his prodigious talent and remarkable achievements in the ring, was by no means a big box office draw before he fought pay-per-view king Oscar de la Hoya in May, 2007.
And the 24/7 preview shows for his fight with Hatton suggested that Mayweather was essentially a decent young man who just wanted to look after his mother and his kids. It appeared that the preoccupation with money and material goods was simply borne out of the fact that he had come from nothing.
But his appearances on 24/7 still came across as somewhat false. He always appeared to be acting. Indeed, it is arguable that the only moment in which we saw the real Mayweather was when he was discussing the fragile nature of his hands with a doctor. It was the one time when we saw real vulnerability in his eyes. There was a genuine fear within that he might be forced to quit the sport he loved.
And yet, that is exactly what Mayweather did after defeating Hatton. He retired not out of necessity but out of choice. He had no legitimate reason for doing so. He effectively turned his back on boxing, saying he did not need it anymore.
This rankled with many fight fans as there appeared to be a number of viable challengers to his status as boxing’s pound-for-pound king. Indeed, Mayweather has long been accused of hand-picking opponents, tackling certain fighters at precisely the right time; his premature retirement merely served to strengthen the suspicion that Mayweather did not fancy taking on certain boxers.
So now that ‘The Prodigal Son’ has returned should we turn our backs on him?
Perhaps, but we won’t. Sports fans – and boxing fans in particular – have a remarkable ability to overlook the flaws in a certain character if that character is possessed of a unique talent. Mayweather is such a talent.
He is not only blessed with blistering speed but also grace and elegance. His mastery of the art of defence can be truly breathtaking. Indeed, Mayweather is capable of reminding people of why boxing used be considered a noble art.
Indeed, his skills are precisely what drew an estimated 3,000 people to a small gym in London last week for an open training session with Pretty Boy.
For a sport which is said to be dying a slow death, that was a remarkable and significant achievement. Outside of Pacquiao, Hatton or the now retired de la Hoya, is there really any other fighter in the world who could have done this?
There are numerous reasons for disliking Mayweather the person but boxing clearly needs Mayweather the boxer. It is just rather annoying that he knows as much.
Champions have no obligation to be nice guys but some humility and even the slightest glimpse of their humanity makes their successes far more palatable.
Sourced via setanta.com
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