By James Slater: If anyone had retained the slightest hope that rival superstars and Pound-for-Pounders Floyd Mayweather Junior and Manny Pacquiao would ever fight, what “Money” had to say yesterday in Las Vegas surely crushed any fading chance of the mega-fight happening.
Although Mayweather has seen Pac-Man pursue legal action over his PED claims ( with Manny suing Floyd for defamation back in 2009), he could not resist making the same claims again yesterday. Shortly after making his grand arrival in Vegas – along with fellow “Ring Kings” Miguel Cotto, Shane Mosley and Saul Alvarez – the unbeaten 35-year-old great launched into the man he is not fighting on Saturday night; Pacquiao.
“This motherf****r was 106-pounds [at the start of his pro career] and he’s just walking through Cotto. And Cotto can’t knock down Mosley, but he can? Come on, Man,” Mayweather said to gathered members of the media. “Go back and look at pictures. His head is small and then all of a sudden his head just grew? Come on, stop this. Go back and look at pictures and tell me this man’s head didn’t just get bigger. You’re going to tell me all this shit is all natural? Come on, man, stop!”
Mayweather, as steamed as we’ve ever seen him, then argued that his agreeing to take on a Pacquiao not wiling to adhere to his OSRDT demands would be a danger to his health.
“Health is more important than anything,” Mayweather stated. “Because guess what? When my career is over, if I’m hurt because of something that has happened in a fight, I can’t come to you and say, ‘I need money for this and for that.’ So my health is more important.”
Mayweather, when pushed on whether or not he believes Pacquiao is taking PED’s, replied that “it’s basic common sense,” that he is doing so.
Pacquiao, of course, is vehement in his denials, and there is no proof that the 33-year-old eight-weight champion has ever taken, or is taking anything illegal – despite what Mayweather says. And that’s where we are right now and where we’ve been for the last three years or more: with Mayweather refusing to fight Pac-Man until he is sure he is not cheating, and Pacquiao refusing to jump through Floyd’s hoops.
The bottom line is this: if anyone still thinks this fight is ever, ever going to happen, they are simply fooling themselves. Way more than enough has been written about this would be fight already, and now is the time for everyone involved in the sport to stop wasting our time and move on.
As to whether or not Pacuaio’s legal team will get busy once again, that’s something Mayweather clearly isn’t worried about.