By James Slater – Unless superstars Floyd Mayweather Junior and Curtis “Fifty Cent” Jackson are engaging in a well publicised bit of play acting designed to give their boxing rivals false hope, a firm bond has been forever broken. Once “brothers” who would do anything for one another, Mayweather and Jackson have taken to warring on Twitter; the result of “Money” walking away from the rap mega-star’s recently formed TMT Promotions.
Whatever the reasons for Mayweather’s displeasure with his former friend’s plans for TMT – and Fifty, during one of his Twitter rants said he “can’t hang with Floyd no more, I’m tired of running from Manny Pacquiao – Jackson has now formed another outfit, called SMS. The two appear to have become bitter enemies (unless it is all an act designed to benefit them both in the end; highly unlikely considering some of the nasty things the two have said about each other on the social network) and Jackson will now concentrate on promoting Yuriorkis Gamboa, Billy Dib, Andre Dirrell and others without the unbeaten master’s assistance.
With the long-running (and highly tiresome) Mayweather-Pacquiao saga dragging on and on, some fans have come to the conclusion that Mayweather is the fighter afraid of taking the fight; what with Pac-Man’s recent “desperate” act of agreeing to take a 45-percent split of the purse and of agreeing to take all the drugs tests Floyd has long since demanded. And it now looks like Fifty Cent is among those people who believe Mayweather wants nothing to do with the southpaw dynamo. This could be the main reason for the split. Mayweather sure hasn’t been left looking good; reduced as he has been to slinging cheap insults at his one-time “brother.”
So, is Mayweather scared of fighting Pacquiao? His diehard fans won’t like it, but it looks like it. Why else would “Money” say no to as much as a possible $100 mill?
But Jackson has another fight he’d like to make now that Mayweather-Pacquiao looks, once again, dead in the water: one between his friend turned enemy and the unbeaten Cuban star Yuriorkis Gamboa! Not only does Fifty want to make the fight – between a featherweight moving up and an all-time great who has boxed as high as 154-pounds – but he is offering $20 million in cash to the winner:
“Gamboa wants to fight Floyd. I will put up an extra 20 million for the winner,” Fifty wrote on Twitter.
And, “Gamboa is the truth, Floyd no that, stop tricking and fight.
“Gamboa moving up in weight Floyd. You should have know not to go against me punk.”
Whether or not Mayweather either bites or calls Fifty’s bluff (surely Gamboa, as talented as he is, cannot fight anywhere close to the 147-pounds Floyd would almost certainly refuse to box any lower than?) remains to be seen. We have, however, seen unlikely match-ups take place before: remember how people laughed and hurled ridicule at the very notion of Pacquiao moving up and taking on the much bigger Oscar De La Hoya in 2008?
Mayweather-Gamboa, if it did happen (on a scale of one-to-ten, a 2 at best to happen in my opinion), it would be the ultimate grudge-match and a helluva big money-spinner. The fans would moan and groan over the weight disparity, but you can be sure they’d tune in all the same – especially if Fifty delivered on his recent stacked under-cards promise, when he said he’d give the fans “the fights they deserve.”
But again, have Mayweather and Jackson faked this whole falling out thing so as to be able to make Mayweather-Gamboa a whole lot easier to make and to turn it into a mega event?
These two guys are either very clever or they are simply acting like big kids in public. Either way, Floyd and Fifty know how to make headlines and get people talking!