Mayweather Interview On His Life and Drama w/ Father

LAS VEGAS -- Exactly one month before the fight, Floyd Mayweather stood virtually nose to nose with yet another distraction last week, this one involving the man from whom he took his name. It started as good-natured ribbing -- all of it with HBO's "24/7" camera whirring and a boom microphone hovering -- but quickly devolved into the two Floyd Mayweathers bellowing vile curses at each other, eyes popping, neck veins bulging, and the father stalking out while the roiling emotions within the son led him to continue the verbal fight in his dressing room, almost as if practicing lines for the next time around.

Their bickering is legend, of course.

But no one in Team Mayweather ever has seen a confrontation between them quite as nasty as this one, and when HBO's all-access series begins this week, with re-broadcasts on CNN, viewers are sure to get another eyeful of teeming dysfunction.

Welcome to Mayweather Fight Camp No. 42, which everyone here expects to culminate the same way as the first 41 -- victoriously -- and what the principal deemed just another day at the office.

By the time Mayweather steps into the ring with Victor Ortiz for their Sept. 17 welterweight title fight here, he will have been idle for 16 1/2 months. He didn't intend it that way but the right fight didn't materialize -- in other words, no progress on the Manny Pacquiao front -- so it took longer than expected.

There were other issues, too.

Regardless what you think about the polarizing, 34-year-old Mayweather, his ability to fight through distractions is beyond compare, because they have been so public and personally threatening, and because he remains pristine inside the ring regardless how dire the upheaval outside.

He was asked if, given the opportunity, he would exchange his eight-figure boxing windfalls for the right to be a common citizen in a workaday job, unencumbered by legal entanglements and irrational jockeying for his attention.

"I don't know," he said. "That's something that I ask myself a lot, though."

This time, the distractions are overpowering.

The same day as the argument with his father, Mayweather was hit with another lawsuit, at least the third one pending against him, by two men who say he gave the say-so for a 2009 shooting incident in which no one was injured. Mayweather was investigated by Las Vegas police but not charged and vehemently denies ordering the shooting, for which another man faces trial next year on charges including attempted murder.

"I can just say that when I wasn't on this level, when I didn't have the money that I have, I didn't see any lawsuits, I didn't have any problems," Mayweather said. "All of a sudden, you reach a certain level, you get lawsuits from left and right."

The most pressing legal issue is a stack of four felony and four misdemeanor charges related to an alleged domestic incident involving the mother of three of Mayweather's four children.

Today, Mayweather said the most important thing in his life is keeping tabs on his daughter Iyanna, a brilliant 11-year-old with a kind heart who openly engages other children in the gym, sharing candy, laughing, playing, all within boundaries respectful of the adults surrounding her. But Mayweather is estranged from his three children with Josie Harris, his accuser in the domestic case, after she secured a protection order prohibiting him from contacting them.

"Every day, I just say, 'That's life,'" Mayweather said of the legal predicaments engulfing him. "It's just life. I'm happy every day to hang out with my daughter, to spend time with my daughter. That's what I do every day. All I do is I come to the boxing gym, I train, I work hard, and I go and spend time with my daughter. That's what's important."

He lives a privileged life. Promoters cater to him. Employees serve his every whim, from continually mopping sweat so he won't slip as he circles the heavy bag, to shoving gobs of Vaseline up his nose between rounds of sparring, to placing his five-figure sports bets at local casinos.

He can't go anywhere without recognition. This is the fame and fortune he sought when he got into professional boxing. He still is learning to cope with the pitfalls.

"I try to keep everything private -- try to," he said. "Because, you know, everything I do. ..."

He likes watching new-release movies. So about once a week, he rents out an entire theater so he and his team can watch a midnight flick without conflict or interruption.

"It's uncomfortable," he said. "But it's life."

He does his roadwork in different locations, in the wee hours of the morning, to keep the tails away.

"If I sent one text message, like, 'I'm going to the gym,' it could be 3 o'clock in the morning, and the gym would be packed at 3 o'clock in the morning," he said. "If everybody knew I'm coming, it'd be packed at 3 in the morning. The gym will have 100, 200, 300 people sometimes. So I block everything out. It's like that every day."

An ever-present figure in training camp is Shantel Jackson, a model who has been around Mayweather for years.

They were engaged last year and the woman whom Mayweather commonly calls "Ms. Jackson" sports a massive ring as evidence.

"Expensive rock," Mayweather said.

There is no timetable for a wedding but Mayweather's fiancee offers at least one quality virtually no one else in his camp does: She generally only speaks when spoken to, and sometimes not even then.

"She's quiet," Mayweather said. "She's real laid back, real, real quiet, don't say too much, keeps to herself."

That isn't something Mayweather is accustomed to in his family dynamic, either.

Wednesday's verbal showdown with his father may be a focal point when HBO debuts the four-part "Mayweather-Ortiz 24/7" on Saturday, but the fighter said it changes nothing in their relationship.

"Having a disagreement, it doesn't matter," he said. "I will always want to see my dad succeed, always."

He does not hate his father but loathes his father's approach to their boxing relationship. Floyd Mayweather Sr. unquestionably was the original molder not only of his son, but also his brother, Roger Mayweather, who trains his son. That he takes every opportunity to let people know it rankles the son.

Throughout their nasty disagreement last week, the only one keeping quiet was Roger Mayweather, which was particularly interesting, since he later left the gym to attend an anger-management class as part of a plea deal in an assault case.

The fighter said his father's weakness as a trainer isn't technical. It's his overarching desire to be seen as the reason a fighter succeeds.

"He wants to be the star and he wants to get all the glory, simple as that," he said.

He added that he and his father go through the ups and downs typical in any family relationship -- magnified and multiplied, of course -- but that his father must quit bringing the fight to the gym.

There's a real fight in 27 days.

"There's already enough negative energy with lawsuits and things, coming up on the regular," he said.

Sugar Ray Robinson, generally regarded as the closest thing to a perfect fighter, excelled for 25 years in a sport he said he didn't like.

Mayweather, an undefeated pro for nearly 15 years, including multiple stints as the sport's pound-for-pound king, was asked if he can identify with that sentiment.

"It's my job. What else can I say?" he said. "When you come to work, you try to have fun. We have a lot of interesting characters in our camp. There's a lot of trash-talking and the gym is packed every day. Once your training camp and your boxing gym is packed every day, once you get to that arena, you're so used to it already being packed and people making noise. And trash-talking is something I'm accustomed to. So once I get in that squared circle, I can block everything out."

What he likes best about his violent professional life is fight night itself, the event, the opportunity to ply his trade for millions of viewers worldwide, which he called "amazing," not unlike his ability to fight through the turmoil around him.

Boxing is yet another twisted family relationship, in a way.

It spawned much of the turmoil.

At the same time, it is his only safe house, his only true refuge.

"That's my home," Mayweather said. "Just another day. Just another fight."

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