Floyd Mayweather Jr. will enter 49th contest (last of SHO contract) w/o any belts?

:think Interesting.

http://sports.yahoo.com/blogs/boxin...--i-m-not-trying-to-be-greedy--084829256.html

So at minimum, it has already been agreed upon that Mayweather is going to be relinquished immediately, per org head Francisco "Paco" Valcárcel.

He also said, apparently, that sometime in the month of May he would vacate the other four belts in his possession - the WBC 147lb & 154lb and WBA Super World 147lb and 154lb titles - and keep only the strictly ornamental million-dollar WBC Diamond Belt, invented for specifically this fight.

So, does this mean on his final match, he will enter the ring 2nd? :huh It would have to mean that, if he is taking on anyone with a title while he doesn't have one himself...right?

 

It doesn't, except for all the reasons that it does.

If he vacates five major belts at once, then we have a whole bunch of trickle-down effects to look at. Who is ranked at the very top of the WBO and WBC and WBA rankings at both weights (just 147lbs in the WBO's case) who might be in the running to compete for all these vacant belts? That creates a huge power vacuum and maybe leads to a bunch of meaningful fights, maybe a tourney or two...

The other implication of this move, if he goes through with it, as I said, would be that he enters his (purportedly) last fight empty-handed. Doing his ring walk 1st, coming in as the challenger. That seems a pretty humble move for someone that has built an image as this ostentatiously prideful character.

 

Sorry, didn't word that correctly - "does this mean on his final match, he will enter the ring 1st?", or "does this mean on his final match, he won't enter the ring 2nd?"

 

Rare, and extremely poor taste. :bart

 

I'd be LMAO if this weren't kinda...worryingly plausible. :err

 

Well, yeah, all champs do. He probably still has replicas of all his green belts down to super feather. You'd be hard pressed to find a champ that doesn't have versions of their belts hanging over their mantlepiece (barring the champs that fell on hard times and had to pawn theirs for a fix so they didn't have to suck any D's)

The point is that he is giving up his fivefold status as titlist in each org in both divisions. It shows a marked change - if you want to call it maturation, just a new perspective, or whatever - in not sweating the small ****.

 

I would hope that he didn't. If they have respect for the game they'll protocol and not put themselves and their egos above it.