Boxing is dead, and if you bought the pay-per-view, it’s pretty to safe to say you’re one of the posers who killed it.
Living in a house full of women, it’s seldom I get to say the words, “I told you so,” but today — the day after one of the worst fights of all time — I’m exercising that right.
All of my Facebook friends received a warning not to purchase the fight, especially for the ridiculous $99.95 asking price.
Mayweather’s too scared to fight, and Manny’s too slow to catch him, I said. “You’re crazy, this is gonna be fight of the century lulz! #MayPac #TeamPac #TeamMayweather,” said many of the responses.
I even went as far as telling Inquisitr readers not to bother the day the fight was announced in a piece entitled , “Floyd Mayweather Vs. Manny Pacquiao: Fight Fans Are Wasting Their Money.”
The February 22 piece called the fight “12 rounds of boredom for the welterweight championship.”
“Expect Floyd to effortlessly dodge Pacquiao’s attacks for 12 rounds and land the occasional pitter-patter fly bite that has no effect whatsoever,” I wrote. “Judges will see this and be forced to score it for Floyd Mayweather.”
Punchstat numbers revealed that Mayweather out-landed Pacquiao 148-81, the L.A. Daily News reports . Of course, none of those 148 punches hurt Pacquiao. In fact, it would probably take two or three Mayweather punches to equal one of Pacquiao’s. But with numbers like that, you can’t exactly justify scoring the fight for Manny.
Yes, boxing is dead because you posers talk about Mayweather like he’s “the best ever” or a “really great fighter” when, in reality, he’s never been in an actual fight.
He boxes. That’s his prerogative, and I don’t fault him for it.
But before you have the nerve to put him in the same league with other legends of the late, great sport — Larry Holmes and Muhammad Ali come to mind — realize those men could box and finish a guy. Not Mayweather.
If any of you bandwagoneers, who ponied up the dough and bragged about watching the fight — either on pay-per-view or in-person — had done the least bit of research, you would have known exactly how this fight was going to end, and you would have known exactly how dumb you were going to feel the morning after.
In Floyd’s last 13 fights, he had two knockouts, and one of those came by way of a sucker-punch that he delivered to Victor Ortiz after the referee separated the two on a break.
At 35-years-old and a paunchy 220 pounds, I would gladly get in the ring with Floyd Mayweather tomorrow, and I could tell you two things about that fight: he would win every round, and it would go the distance. That’s not because I’m any kind of an athlete, mind you. It’s because the man doesn’t have squat for punching power.
That’s why it always cracks me up when boxing play-by-play commentators like Kevin Iole say Floyd landed a “hard shot.” He’s never landed a hard shot on anyone.
As for Manny, his best days were behind him, and the world has known that (or should have) for quite some time. (The recent knockout at the hands of Juan Manuel Marquez is proof and, to a lesser degree, so are the dry-as-dust fights he had with Timothy Bradley.)
Unfortunately, the Mayweather-Pacquiao fight was the last and only “superfight” that boxing had left, and it was such a dud, I can’t imagine any of you would be dumb enough to pay $100 for a rematch (or for any boxing match).
SBNation agrees with me, calling pay-per-view customers “chumps” for biting on the hype.
And yes, some of the Facebookers I tried to warn have hit me up with “You were rights” as well. If only they would have paid me the $100 for allowing them to enjoy their Saturday night instead of wasting it on that garbage.
But why does all this mean boxing is dead, and how is it that you posers are responsible?
It’s because you celebrate hype over substance. Then you try to justify the stupid feeling you have for paying too much by saying things like, “Yes, but Floyd’s a great boxer.”
Maybe. But the sport has always been about more than what Mayweather puts in to it. He certainly won last night’s bout, but he didn’t win the fight. And that’s because he didn’t allow one to occur.
When boxing was alive and well, going to war with an opponent was every bit as important as good footwork, good speed, and good conditioning. You knew at some point that you had to fight. But Floyd made a career of showing us that’s no longer the case. And in the process, he neutered a once noble sport and suckered all of you into supporting his efforts.
So boxing is dead, and you — hashtag tweeters, social media braggarts, people who know nothing about what you’re supporting — are mostly responsible.
[Image via IBVPN ]