Almost always, they go on too long.
The tales of boxers fighting way past their prime are innumerable. Examples of top-level fighters staging an exit on their own terms, at the right time, are vanishingly rare. Rocky Marciano. Lennox Lewis. Joe Calzaghe. And, until recently, Floyd Mayweather.
PERFECT ANSWER TO A BOXER’S MID-LIFE CRISIS
Yes, Mayweather still boasts a 50-0 record. Yes, he stage-managed his exit from pro boxing perfectly, first beating Manny Pacquiao in the most lucrative fight of all time, then easing past Andre Berto to match Marciano’s 49-0 record, and then, in the ultimate display of maximising reward while minimising risk, overtaking it by toying with MMA star Conor McGregor in a bout that was almost as big as Mayweather-Pacquiao but with almost none of the danger.
Since that 2017 affair, Mayweather found, like so many before him, that it was not so much the money that he missed in retirement, but the spotlight. And yet, he was smart enough to know that a comeback in his 40s meant jeopardising those iconic undefeated stats, and smart enough to understand that a boxer who lays claim to the TBE (The Best Ever) sobriquet cannot then fight risk-free opposition.
Then, thanks to a combination of fate and design, Mayweather found the answer: exhibition boxing. Previously an occasional novelty, exhibitions have in recent years become a staple, trading off the triplet fads of nostalgia, celebrity and crossover combat, and dispensing with any requirement for standards or the expectation of real competition.
Whether fans wanted to watch old gunslingers like Mike Tyson or Julio Cesar Chavez one more time, or to see some vapid internet influencers come to blows, or to play fantasy sports by putting mixed martial artists and kickboxers in boxing matches without worrying about a loss going on anyone’s record, Mayweather had found the solution to his mid-life crisis.
FOR THE DOZENS IN ATTENDANCE…
He’s fought the kickboxer Tenshin Nasukawa and the MMA exponent Mikuru Asakura under his own rule set and, when they tried to win, he knocked them out. He’s engaged in public sparring sessions with YouTubers Logan Paul and Deji. He gave his friend Don Moore – an actual boxer, but one nobody has heard of – a payday and carried him to the final bell.
And even if the fans are, for the most part, aware of the true nature of these affairs, Mayweather has also tapped into the tradition of old legends touring appreciative new markets. Yes, fans in Japan and and the UAE knew they weren’t seeing anything meaningful, but Mayweather’s two exhibitions in each of those countries were marketed as rare opportunities to watch one of the greats perform in places he’d never boxed as a professional.
That was also the line being pitched when Mayweather turned up in London last weekend. See the great Floyd Mayweather fight in the UK for the very first time! And yet, the event was a disastrous flop.
Fan footage showed the echoingly empty approach to the arena. The broadcast couldn’t hide the seas of empty seats inside it. Why had almost nobody turned up to watch one of the greatest boxers in history, and certainly one of the most marketable?
There were several reasons, and one hopefully more telling than the others.
Most obviously, the event had been very poorly marketed. Even among boxing fans, few people were even aware it was happening. The mainstream press did not cover it. Trade magazine Boxing News wrote not one word on it. It was being screened by a new streaming platform with no track record. Even social media was largely mute.
For so long, Mayweather has been the ultimate self-publicist, but even he had had very little to say in the build-up. Perhaps he had grown complacent, thinking his star power spoke for itself wherever he went.
Well, not in London it didn’t. It’s one thing “treating” the good people of Dubai to the sight of him playfighting with someone who couldn’t hold pads for him, but the British crowd are a more discerning lot, and one that is hardly starved of big-name boxing. Why spend money on an exhibition, even if it is featuring Mayweather, when a few months either side of this event the UK hosts real fights involving the likes of Tyson Fury, Anthony Joshua, Artur Beterbiev, Liam Smith, Joe Joyce and more?
NOVICES STEAL A LEGEND’S THUNDER
Second, it was the wrong opponent at the wrong time. That weekend, all eyes were on the ultimate celebrity showdown, Tommy Fury vs Jake Paul, which was staged 3,000 miles away in Saudi Arabia but which was being broadcast on British PPV. Make of that contest what you will, but at least It was a fair match and a real fight.
Mayweather had lined up a “celebrity” opponent of his own, Aaron Chalmers, a Geordie Shore alum who had also compiled a modest 6-2 record in MMA. He was neither famous enough as a TV personality to command casual attention nor good enough as a fighter to instil any sense of unpredictability, and neither man even had the common decency to fake a grudge – seemingly a prerequisite for these kinds of things.
Finally, the entire card was comprised of exhibitions. Not one of the bouts constituted real competition, and at the end of the day, who wants to watch any sport where no result is rendered at the conclusion? Would a football fan want to watch a tournament in which shots on target are forbidden, and even if goals are scored, they’re not recorded? How about a golf game which never makes it to the green, or a race in which everybody finishes at the same time?
And this undercard was a mix of combat athletes with no significant repute, and supposedly famous non-fighters from the social media realm whose announced stats focused on their number of followers, not bouts. There was no reason for a real boxing fan to watch, while those who are into the “influencer boxing” scene were instead looking forward to Fury v Paul.
For the few who did turn up, the entire show was a bore – not that they would have noticed, for most of this demographic seemed more interested in filming themselves watching the fights rather than actually watching the fights.
Finally – hopefully – the most important takeaway from Floyd’s flop will be that both boxing fans and the general public have now grown tired of his exhibition circus. Without fail, boxing exhibitions are either boring or horrible mismatches, or both, and that’s not a recipe for longevity. Already this trend has gone on for far too long. It can only be hoped now, that if even Floyd “Money” Mayweather can no longer generate cash from it, that it may at last be over.
At 46, despite many more millions of dollars’ worth of his beloved “easy money” banked over the past four years, barely taking a punch as he did so, and keeping that pristine record intact, even Mayweather, supposedly one of the most savvy of them all, has had one fight too many.
Good read!