Victor Ortiz and Floyd Mayweather Jr. will fight Saturday night in Las Vegas, with Victor’s belt, and Floyd’s perfect record, both on the line. There isn’t much hate between the fighters, and the only real controversy came from Mayweather who was upset with the way HBO’s 24/7 series was edited. About the only trash talk I heard came at Thursday’s press conference.
When Ortiz’s trainer, Danny Garcia, took the podium, he asked Floyd to fight cleanly. The implication was that Floyd is generally dirty — something I hadn’t previously heard.
“I want you to fight a clean fight. That is all I ask,” Garcia said. “You hold your elbows up and you throw your elbows. We want a clean fight.”
Mayweather shrugged off the comment, saying “We are in the ring hitting each other. It is a fight. There is no such thing as a clean fight.”
As I said, I never heard fighters complain that Floyd was dirty. In general, he doesn’t engage closely enough to use nasty tricks like headbutts in the ring. Maybe this was Garcia’s way of trying to get something in Floyd’s head. If that was the case, it’s not a bad idea — Victor needs all the help he can get to have an edge in the ring.
