Larry Brown Sports

Even though 50 Cent and Floyd Mayweather Jr. are no longer as close as they used to be, 50 still has his former best friend’s back when it comes to boxing debates.

The rapper joined ESPN’s “First Take” Thursday and was asked about the elusive Mayweather-Manny Pacquiao dream fight that never happened. Though host Skip Bayless tried to put words in 50′s mouth by asking a loaded question, the rapper said Mayweather is not scared of Pacquiao.

“He’s not afraid of Pacquiao or any fighter,” 50 answered in response to a question about how afraid Mayweather was of losing to Pac-Man.

50 explained that Mayweather looks at his fights as a businessman and takes a measured approach when selecting opponents.

“It’s more of him saying who I have to fight. At this point, it’s more him sorting out who’s the perfect opponent than him fighting the toughest fighter to fight.”

50 Cent confirmed what most boxing fans already knew — Mayweather doesn’t pick what will be the most thrilling fight, but the one where he can maximize revenue while minimizing his risks.

He further elaborated on Mayweather’s mentality, explaining that the biggest impediment to the superfight was Mayweather’s stubbornness.

“He concentrates on how much someone else is getting paid opposed to how much he is actually getting paid,” said 50. “He sees himself in a space that nobody else sees himself in, and that he’s so high on top of it that he shouldn’t actually give some of the other great fighters at this point.

“That’s $100 million and he just left it.”

50 also said he would have picked Mayweather to win had the two fought.

Most people have picked up on ESPN’s promotional tag line and spun this interview as 50 saying Mayweather “ducked” Pacquiao, but that’s not exactly how I see it. 50 is saying that Mayweather is not scared of Pacquiao or any fighter. The term “ducked” only was brought up because of Bayless. According to 50, the biggest reason the fight didn’t happen is because Mayweather didn’t want Pacquiao to get filthy rich off of it, which was evident based on Floyd refusing to give Manny a cut of the pay-per-view or split the purse 50-50. To use a cliche, Floyd cut off his nose to spite his face, which is why fans have been so frustrated with him.

You can watch the interview below:

Read The Rest of the Story…

Once again, we are not going to get into detail about which side is holding up the fight the entire world has been begging to see. It could be Floyd Mayweather Jr. and it could be Manny Pacquiao. At the end of the day, we simply have to take a look at all the crap we’ve seen flying out of both corners and make an educated assessment. After Mayweather defeated Miguel Cotto on Saturday night, he said that Pacquiao’s promoter Bob Arum is the one holding the fight up. During a recent interview with ESPN 110 in Las Vegas, Arum said that is completely bogus and compared Floyd to one of Adolph Hitler’s associates.

“For two years Pacquiao has said that he will take any drug test, whoever administers it, so why is that still being talked about by Mayweather?” Arum said according to Sports Radio Interviews. “You see Mayweather is from the school of propaganda that Joseph Goebbels, who was (Adolf) Hitler’s publicist, adopted. The more you say things over and over again the more people believe them.”

Arum also said that Pacquiao’s side has proposed a number of scenarios in which the fighters would split the money evenly and Mayweather continues to turn them down. As for why, Arum had some similar thoughts to the ones we shared with you earlier from Pacquiao’s trainer.

Read The Rest of the Story…

Floyd Mayweather Jr. insists he wants to fight Manny Pacquiao and Manny Pacquiao insists he wants to take on Floyd Mayweather Jr., but we all know there is much more to the situation than meets the eye. Floyd recently reiterated the fact that the fight will probably never happen because Pacquiao won’t take a drug test. After he defeated Miguel Cotto over the weekend, Mayweather again told reporters that Pacquiao is ducking him, not the other way around. Pacquiao’s camp, however, is saying they will do anything it takes to make the fight happen.

“Would Manny beat Floyd? You bet,” Pacquiao’s trainer Freddie Roach said Tuesday according to The Ring. “The way to beat Floyd is to outwork him every minute of every round. Manny is the only fighter capable of executing that game plan.

“Activity kills Mayweather. You need to stay busy against him and not let him dictate the pace by slowing down the fight. Southpaws are his other weakness. Manny is just a bad combination for Floyd to fight. If it would bring Floyd into the ring, I’d agree to have Manny fight him right-handed.”

Pacquiao said that he watched the Mayweather-Cotto fight but is focusing on his June 9 fight against Tim Bradley. While there has been some recent speculation that Pacquiao’s newfound relationship with God may influence him to retire, he insists he has no plans to do so. Even still, it’s unlikely the fight will ever happen.

Photo credit: Chris Cozzone-US PRESSWIRE

Many have labeled it the fight that will never happen, and the more time that passes the more likely those people are to be correct. For a number of reasons which we have heard over a period of what feels like a lifetime, Floyd Mayweather Jr. and Manny Pacquiao will probably never square off in the boxing ring. One second it’s for financial reasons and the next it has to do with drug testing. It’s getting to the point where it hardly matters, because clearly talking about it isn’t going to get anything done.

However, for those of you who believe it is Mayweather ducking Pacquiao and not the other way around, Floyd had a message for you during an interview with Tim Dahlberg of the Associated Press on Tuesday. In fact, he had several messages.

Read The Rest of the Story…

Everyone wants to see Floyd Mayweather Jr. and Manny Pacquiao square off in the ring, but with each passing day it becomes less likely that it will ever happen. A variety of excuses like a lack of pay-per-view money or an unwillingness to split the fight money 50-50 have been used by both fighters. For boxing fans, the back-and-forth is one of the most frustrating dynamics in the history of the sport. Mike Tyson even believes it has been so annoying that they should be thrown in jail for it.

“Listen if I was President I would throw (Pacquiao and Mayweather) in jail if they didn’t fight,” Tyson said during an interview with WXYT in Detroit. “I’d have them arrested. You can’t do that but that’s what I would try to do. I’d be like ‘these guys need to get locked up and find a new profession until they get their heads clear.’”

For once, I actually almost agree with Mike — aside from the jail part of course. The reasons these two have come up with to not fight one another are embarrassing. The entire boxing world wants it to happen, yet Pacquiao and Mayweather continue to annoy all of us by talking trash and avoiding the issue.

On a completely separate note, Tyson was also asked if plans were being discussed to make a Hangover 3 movie: “I was told there was one and I would like to participate in it but we will see what happens guys.” From the things I have heard about the second one, they should just leave the legend alone.

Manny Pacquiao and Floyd Mayweather Jr. each have fights scheduled in the upcoming months, but they won’t be facing each other. Floyd aggressively pursued a fight with Pac Man for May 5th but the Filipino wouldn’t agree to one. Mayweather says Pacquiao is ducking him. Now we’re hearing from Manny that Floyd’s financial offer was inadequate.

“He offered me $40 million, and no pay-per-view [money],” Pacquiao said, breaking into a laugh, according to Yahoo! Sports’ Kevin Iole. “No pay-per-view. Can you believe that? Would you do that? Come on. What would he say if I offered him $50 million – not $40 million, $50 million – and said ‘No pay-per-view. Take this money and be happy, but no pay-per-view.’ He wouldn’t do it, either.

“I told him, ‘OK, 50-50 [with the money] and I’ll agree to everything else,’ ” Pacquiao said. “I told him I would agree to all of the other things he was demanding. Everything. Even the blood testing he wanted, I would do it. But it had to be 50-50.”

Pacquiao says he wanted Floyd to be guaranteed $50 million with the rest of the revenue split — 55% to the winner and 45% to the loser. That seems like a fair deal.

Pacquiao has said that money is not an important factor to him when it comes to a fight with Floyd, but that doesn’t mean he should be treated unfairly. If Floyd insists he should be paid more guaranteed money and receive a greater cut of pay-per-view revenue than Manny, I can understand it, and I would expect Pacquiao to accept those terms. But to cut Manny completely out of the pay-per-view revenue is unfair.

Go here to read the entire history of the Manny Pacquiao-Floyd Mayweather Jr. negotiations

Floyd Mayweather Jr. continues to talk trash to Manny Pacquiao, even though the two won’t be fighting in the near future. Mayweather announced Wednesday he will face Miguel Cotto on May 5th instead of Manny Pacquiao as many were hoping. Money couldn’t resist taking a jab at Pac Man, writing on Twitter:

Even though it was Floyd who was thought to be doing all the ducking in the past, he’s now turning the tables. Just because he’s been pushing to face Pac Man recently doesn’t make him a tough guy, but I like him calling out Pacquiao. If Manny is going to let promoter Bob Arum block the megafight everyone wants to see, then he deserves the criticism.

Step up Manny and make this happen.