Floyd Mayweather faced another bout of fire from detractors who say the former pound-for-pound king spawned the current YouTuber boxer trend.
The five-weight world champion’s 2017 clash with Conor McGregor celebrates its half-decade anniversary in 2022. But it’s that event that gave free rein to outsiders entering the boxing ring to make millions.
Now, this isn’t necessarily Mayweather’s fault, but more that McGregor was able to move over to the sport and so easily hoodwink fans into shelling out for the Pay Per View.
Upon the main event commencing, McGregor’s boxing skills as a teenager in Ireland had utterly left his body. His unorthodox pounding of Mayweather with the wrong part of his gloves and his awkward stance were clear evidence of this lack of skill.
Nonetheless, the pair convinced over four million fans to part with almost a hundred bucks for a fight that was one-sided in terms of pugilistic know-how.
Therefore, anyone with enough social media followers could capitalize on this whether they could box or not. If McGregor could get away with it, then anybody could.
Mayweather knew this beforehand, but the savvy businessman he was also learned that people would buy it regardless.
Enter YouTubers who hold a similar mindset for their followers. They know whatever they do, their fans will watch and pay for the privilege.
This scenario gives them the freedom to use Pay Per View as the vehicle to drive one-off subscriptions. It’s a fool-proof plan that’s almost guaranteed to make money.
But some are irked by the current state of boxing when YouTubers can parade as professional boxers despite never fighting a real boxer. They can also polarize audiences by stating their intentions to face the most significant names with no sense to do so whatsoever.
They are creating dislike, something Floyd Mayweather always complained he had in abundance. A large portion of the fans who bought Mayweather PPVs did so to watch him lose. Sadly for them, it never happened.
YouTubers employ the same tactics, hence why Mayweather gets blamed in specific sectors.
FLOYD MAYWEATHER
Former middleweight contender Tureano Johnson is one of those who aired his views on the matter recently.
He said regarding YouTubers: “Far from the truth. Jealousy! Like Floyd, who coned the fans with his last few fights.
“Beginning with Manny that took place five years too late, along with a broken Berto.
“The integrity of boxing is now again at risk, from Floyd’s freak show to [Jake] Paul’s circus act,” he added.
A fan put it even more bluntly than that over the weekend. They said: “Floyd Mayweather was/is harmful to the sport of boxing.
“He is the best ever. But he’s contributed greatly to the mess that boxing is today.”
That statement seems to sum things up in a nutshell.
Things are unlikely to change too much in the future until the major platforms step away from giving YouTubers their undeserved spotlight.
Floyd Mayweather is not the only one to blame.
The views expressed in this article are opinions of Phil Jay.
Phil Jay – Editor of World Boxing News since 2010 with over one billion views. Follow WBN on Twitter @WorldBoxingNews.
