Floyd Mayweather Jr. On Twitter: ‘Hey Fans, Pick My Next Opponent For Me’
Floyd Mayweather Jr., two fights in to his estimated $250 million, six-fight contract with the CBS-owned Showtime network, took to Twitter on Sunday, asking fans to pick his next opponent. But there’s a catch. The undefeated, consensus pound-for-pound best boxer in the world gave his Twitter fans only two choices.
Conspicuously not offered as an option, the one fighter most every boxing fan would prefer to see in the ring against Floyd Mayweather Jr. is Manny Pacquiao. The Filipino icon, who devastated several top-quality foes with a combination of blinding speed and thunderous knockout power, was long looked upon as the only fighter between 140 pounds and 154 who had a legitimate chance to defeat Floyd Mayweather Jr.
But the 35-year-old Pacquiao’s star dimmed considerably after a lackluster decision loss to American Timothy Bradley and a startling one-punch knockout defeat at the hands of longtime Mexican rival Juan Manuel Marquez.
Bradley is also considered a worthy foe for Floyd Mayweather Jr., but he too failed to make the welterweight champion’s short list of opponents for his next bout.
Here are the choices Floyd Mayweather Jr. served up for fans via his Twitter account: Amir Khan or Marcos Maidana.
Who should I fight next? Go to http://t.co/5sw7zBhXwo and vote. I’m going to let the fans decide. pic.twitter.com/Os9kFyAJj2
— Floyd Mayweather (@FloydMayweather) February 4, 2014
Mayweather posed the challenge to fans on his Facebook and Instagram accounts as well as Twitter, where the junior middleweight belt-holder has 4.66 million followers.
The choice for Twitter and social media Mayweather fans comes down to this: speed vs. power. Amir Khan is a 27-year old Englishman of Pakistani descent whose lightning-quick hands make him perhaps the only fighter out there who could match or even exceed Floyd Mayweather Jr. in the hand-speed department.
Marcos Maidana, on the other hand, is a granite-jawed Argentine power puncher who has KO’ed 31 of his 38 opponents, while taking only three losses, all by decision — including a controversial loss to Khan in 2010.
In December, 30-year-old Maidana took on the highly touted American Adrian Broner whose Mayweather-like total package of speed, power and flashy bravado appeared to make him a likely successor to the current pound-for-pound champ.
But Maidana dispensed with those notions, hammering the brash Broner for 12 rounds to take a unanimous decision victory.
Once the results from Twitter and social media are in, Floyd Mayweather Jr. will take a 45-0 record into the fight against either Khan or Maidana on May 3 at the MGM Grand Garden Arena in Mayweather’s current home base of Las Vegas, Nevada.
According to a report yesterday in Britain’s Daily Mail, the stakes are extremely high. While most boxing analysts would expect Floyd Mayweather Jr. to defeat either Khan or Maidana without undue difficulty, the champ, who will turn 37 on February 24, has shown some signs of aging — however slight — in recent bouts.
An upset loss would not only be shocking, it would likely derail what the Mail reports is a $200 million showdown between Mayweather and Manny Pacquiao that would take place on September 13, also in Vegas.
Floyd Mayweather Jr. will not need Twitter for fans to let him know they want that fight to happen.
