The eagerly anticipated fightbetween Floyd Mayweather Jr andConor McGregorhas been slammed as a ‘farce’ that will hurt the sport of boxing, by former champion, Oscar De La Hoya.
De La Hoya, a former multi-weight world champion, made the plea in a passionate Facebook post urging fans away from the “circus” fight that would put a “black eye” on the sport.Describing thebuildup to the fightas a distraction, De La Hoya said it would be similar to when Mayweather Jr. finally fought Manny Pacquiao in a 2015 one-sided affair,Mirrorwrites.
“Boxing is starting to dig out of the hole that Floyd and Manny shoveled by waiting seven years to put on a fight that ended up being as dullas it was anti-climactic,”De La Hoya wrote.
“But if you think Mayweather/Pacquiao was a black eye for our sport — a matchup between two of the best pound-for-pound fighters that simply didn’t deliver — just wait until the best boxer of a generation dismantles someone who has never boxed competitively at any level — amateur or professional. …Our sport might not ever recover.
”De La Hoya, who has been working to promote a Sept. 16 middleweight monster clash betweenGennady Golovkin and Canelo Alvarez,insisted that 2017 has been a “banner year” for top-notch fights that have“reinvigorated interest from the ever-elusive casual fan,”adding that any bout heavily in favour of Mayweather would kill that momentum.
“I fully understand the initial attraction from any fan of combat sports,”he wrote.“But success in one sport does not guarantee success in another.…It’s not like McGregor would be fighting a good fighter, let alone a mediocre one. He would be fighting the best. …I happen to be a pretty good golfer. Could I potentially hold my own on one of the second-tier tours? Maybe. But would I be able to compete with Rory McIlroy, Jordan Speith or Sergio Garcia? Of course not.“Floyd’s and Conor’s motivation is clear. It’s money,”he wrote.“But it’s also a lack of consequences for when the fight ends up being the disaster that is predicted. After this fight, neither of them will need us anymore.
Floyd will go back to retirement — presumably for good thistime with another nine-figure paycheck — and Conor will go back to the UFC.“It’s a win-win for them. It’s a lose-lose for us.…We will have squandered another opportunity to bring boxing back to its rightful place as the sportof kings.
”Mayweather, 40, retired at 49-0 as the sport’s No. 1 pound-for-pound fighter, whereas McGregor, 28,has taken the UFC world by storm as the first fighter to simultaneously wear two belts back in November.
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