This week’s edition of On the Ropes Boxing Radio featured an exclusive interview with boxing trainer Floyd Mayweather Senior whose son, Floyd Jr., recently defeated Sugar Shane Mosley in a dominant performance. Here are some excerpts from that interview:
Regarding what he believes his son did that enabled him to be so successful against Mosley:
“He did what his Daddy told him to do. I told him to stay behind his jab and keep Shane in the middle of the ring. I told him that Shane can’t box. You’re faster than him, you’re younger than him, you’re more mobile than him, you’re slicker than him, you’re more clever than him—he has nothing on you. I know that all those attributes that he has over Shane and that’s a lot of things to overcome.”
Regarding his thoughts in the second round when Mosley caught Floyd with some good right hands:Regarding athletes who use performance enhancers in boxing:
“A lot of these guys today can be dominant. The much weaker guy can be dominant because he has some kind of enhancement drugs in him and that’s why boxing is falling out of hand and beginning to be a bad game. Not only boxing, but you got baseball, football, you know, you name any sports you want to name. They’re attacking everybody. I don’t know. They’re attacking Tiger Woods, too, as far as that goes. I’m letting you know that so many people get into drugs. I’m not saying that Tiger Woods is doing that, I’m not saying that any guys are—well, we do know about Shane and he didn’t have any stuff in him because he was checked. There it is, right there. Without no stuff in him, now you see the real Shane.”
Regarding Floyd’s win over Shane in the context of Mosley’s win over Antonio Margarito:
“Well you know what? They kept talking about how Floyd was scared of Margarito. Little Floyd already told everybody he could whoop Margarito. He was not worried about no Margarito so what Floyd did was kill two birds with one stone. He let Shane go whoop Margarito and Shane beat Margarito like Floyd beat Shane, so that showed him he would have done the same thing Shane did—knocked him out. Little Floyd would have done the same thing to him because Floyd is too fast, too quick, and too smooth for Margarito.”
On being in Camp with his son for the last two fights during which he seemingly performed at a higher level:
“It’s because he’s a different animal when his father’s around because I’m the originator! I’m the motivator, innovator, creator of that boy Floyd and that’s what I do. You know, Floyd still makes errors, but I tightened him up and straightened him out. He’s a student of the game so it’s not hard to train him. I’ve been training Little Floyd since he was one year old. As a matter of fact, since he first came out of his mother’s womb I’ve been training my son.”
Regarding the fact that Mayweather Senior predicted how this fight would unfold more accurately than all of the other past guests on the show:
“Hey, I’m a scientist of boxing. I know boxing like the back of my hand. A lot of people you’re talking to are just everyday people and you’re talking to news writers, and you’re talking to maybe somebody who’s playing football or basketball or some other sport, but they definitely aren’t talking about boxing because there was no surprise to me and there was no doubt in me about Shane and Floyd fighting because I already knew that there isn’t no 38 year old guy who was going to whoop little Floyd. Floyd did just what he was supposed to do.”
On the fact that Floyd Junior seemed to raise his game to a new level we had not seen previously:
“Well you know what? One thing, I’ll tell you this right here. He’s the guy that can do what he needs to do when it’s needed. One thing that stepped his game up was that Shane hurt him and when Shane hurt him that brought the animal out of him. As you can see, it brought the animal out of him. Me myself, I would have been a little bit more cautious about the approach. I think I would have let my head clear for another round or so, but he didn’t do that. He jumped right on top of Shane, then he looked out of the ropes and said, ‘Daddy, what do you want me to do next?’ I don’t know if you have seen that part of it yet though, but he said, ‘Daddy what do you want me to do next?’. I said, ‘Keep doing what you’re doing. Keep him in the center of the ring and you won’t have no problems’, and he said, ‘Okay’.”
On whether he believes his son would have fought differently had Shane not hurt him in round two:
“No, I don’t think you would have seen that level. I really don’t. Little Floyd, as long as he wins the fight he’s cool. He’s going to box and move around a little bit here, and maybe throw a two and three punch combination, and go ahead, then pop, pop, pop, and he would be fine with that. That would be fine with him doing that as long as you clearly know that you are winning the fight and you are in control, but you got to remember, this fight was early. It was the second round. The fight was early. Floyd got hurt early in the game so automatically he knew he was in the rear because the first round, you could give Floyd the first round or you could have gave it to Shane, I believe, but the second round was clearly Shane. So Shane made him have to fight and take it to another level.”
On whether he believes a fight between his son versus Manny Pacquiao is a fight that could happen:
“As you can see right now, I believe for a minute everybody was a fool for thinking Pacquiao could whoop Floyd, but you know what? Pretty much all of those thoughts have changed because they know that Pacquiao is not the fighter Floyd is and let me tell you right now—he would beat Pacquiao easier than he beat Shane, with or without whatever it is.”
On whether he believes his son is capable of scoring a knockout against Pacquiao:
“I’m just going to tell you like this. There are a lot of things people can do but sometimes people can’t do things if things aren’t right, and I know you can understand me. Overall, if Floyd and Pacquiao fought on the same level, like with Shane, and Pacquiao does what he’s supposed to do and Floyd does what he’s supposed to do and they’re both clear of everything—Floyd knocks him the hell out. Yes!”
On whether he believes Pacquiao will be willing to subject himself to the Olympic style drug testing:
“Hell no he ain’t going to take no tests. He won’t take no tests. He wants to BS everybody and keep messing around like he’s this big tough fighter. You aren’t tough at all because you’re not willing to take the test. What is that blood going to do to you? Whatever blood test you take, Floyd’s got to take the same blood test. If it makes you weak, it’s going to make him weak so you can stop with all of that BS. He ain’t all what they think he is. Right now, believe me, all the people know what it is. It’s so plain a blind man can see what’s going on. Why won’t you fight? A test? Everybody needs to take the test. When you start taking the tests that will stop a lot of the corruption that’s going on in the game and it’s understanding because it can kill somebody, it can kill people, it can leave people brain damaged. You can get messed up in all kinds of ways. Somebody’s head can get brain damaged, somebody’s kid can be killed. You know, that breaks families up, especially over some BS nonsense that shouldn’t even be there. If you can’t do the game right, don’t do it all.”
On how he thinks his son would do at middleweight, possibly against someone like champion Sergio Martinez:
“My son is not a big guy. He’s just not a big guy, he’s not big. He’s about 5’8”, maybe 5’7 ½”. He’s just not a big person. I could see him outsmarting Martinez. Yeah, I could see him outsmarting Martinez. One thing about it, I don’t want anybody having an edge over my son because that’s my son, but I never have liked my son fighting southpaws. It’s not that he can’t beat them, because he beat all of them, his record reflects that, but I don’t like my son fighting southpaws. My son fought two southpaws that I know of. He fought one early in his career, pretty close before he got the title and he got cut pretty bad over the eye. Then when he fought Chop Chop Corley, Chop Chop Corley caught him off guard and hit him a couple of times in one fight. Like I said, it’s not that he can’t win because he has won, but I will just say a lot of guys power still come from a different angle and a different size and he’s not a great big guy. There’s no question in my mind that I got the strategy to train my son to offset a lot of this stuff, but I just don’t like him fighting southpaws because stuff comes from a different angle.”
On being reminded that Pacquiao himself is a southpaw and if he believes the smaller size of Pacquiao offsets his concerns regarding left-handed fighters:
“Even with Pacquiao, he’s a much shorter guy and we are not worried about no Martinez because Pacquiao is the one doing all of the damage and he’s the one knocking out these big men. That’s what everyone wants to see, so let’s see it because even if Martinez fights my son, he’s going to take the test, too. Why does everyone have to take it but Pacquiao?”
On what he believes will ultimately happen with the saga between his son and Pacquiao:
“I’ll tell you this right here. I bet you any kind of money, before Manny Pacquiao fights my son—I guarantee you, watch what I tell you because you’ll be calling me up next and telling me about this. Manny Pacquiao, before he fights my son, I bet you he won’t fight my son. I bet you he won’t take the test if he has to fight my son. I bet you he don’t take the test. I guarantee you.”
Source: eastsideboxing.com
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