Floyd Mayweather Jr
. is fond of saying he doesn't fight for legacy anymore, instead preferring prize money
. If he beats Shane Mosley on Saturday night in their non-title fight at the MGM Grand in Las Vegas, the undefeated six-time champion stands to collect the most lucrative payday of his life. The windfall would not necessarily be the direct result of a win over his 38-year-old opponent, but because a victory would set up Mayweather vs. Manny Pacquiao, a fight which would be the most anticipated non-heavyweight match in decades. Record-setting money almost certainly would follow, and fight fans finally would get the main event they have been clamoring for since discussions broke down between the camps in January.
"Well, the thing is this, like I said before, of course I want to please the fans, and I want to please everybody that's buying pay-per-view," Mayweather said, "but self-preservation is the law of the land. I come first. I must fight for Floyd Mayweather first."
Considered perhaps the most proficient pound-for-pound fighter of all-time, Mayweather is better than a 4-1 favorite to beat Mosley, the WBA welterweight champion whose career is resurgent after he dismantled Antonio Margarito in his most recent bout.
A victory, according to some industry estimates, would yield Mayweather between $15 million to $20 million in prize money and perhaps more than twice that if a deal can be reached to fight Pacquiao. Mayweather (40-0, 25 KOs) is no stranger to wildly profitable fights. His 2007 victory over Oscar De La Hoya set a record with 2.7 million pay-per-view buys and reportedly earned Mayweather $25 million.
"There's no [formula] on how to beat Floyd Mayweather," said Mayweather, 33, who also has beaten Ricky Hatton, Juan Manuel Marquez and Zab Judah, among other highly regarded fighters. "There's no [formula] on how to beat me yet, so the thing is this, everyone is trying to solve the problem. It's like a difficult math problem that no one can solve. No one can solve it."
Mosley (46-5, 39 KOs) has been training hard to become the first, although he'll fight under the specter of having admitted to unknowingly using performance-enhancing drugs before his 2003 bout with De La Hoya. Mayweather has made it a point to mention that during virtually every interview he has given leading up to the fight. Mosley, meantime, has declined to answer questions in detail about his link to Victor Conte and Balco, from whom he allegedly received designer steroids. He instead has been spending much of his time during prefight news conferences sparring verbally with Mayweather, who has made such bravado an art form.
"I mean everybody grows up wanting to fight for a belt and wants to be world champion, and for them to just dismiss it like, 'Oh, I'm bigger than the belt,' I don't know," Mosley said of Mayweather preferring fortune over titles. "That just doesn't seem like [Mayweather is] in the sport for the sport. He's in it just for the money, which is good if he wants to do that. If he wants to fight for money, to each his own, but I love the glory, the legendary status of being a champion and winning belts and being the best guy out there. If he did that, the money is going to come regardless."
Source: washingtonpost.com
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