Floyd Mayweather had plenty to say for himself at the Rizin press conference yesterday. He is set to take on Mikuru Asakura in an exhibition boxing match on September 24th.
Asakura challenged him to fight wearing MMA gloves and was given short shrift by Mayweather who responded,
“If Rizin wanted me to do MMA they would have paid for MMA, they paid for boxing. If I had chosen MMA I would have been the best but boxing happened to come around before MMA.”
He also couldn’t resist the urge to get in a dig at former foe Conor McGregor pointing out that the Irishman had also been forced to face him under boxing rules,
“I’m the A-side and when you’re the A-side you call the shots. I’ve bust my ass and worked extremely hard to be the boss no different from (the fight with) Conor Mcgregor. Floyd Mayweather is always the boss, always in control, I’ve put in my hard work to be the boss so you do what I want you to do.”
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Entertaining place
Mayweather might not be known for putting on entertaining fights but he certainly knows how to sell himself. His message for the fans in Japan was that,
“Japan is a great place, very entertaining place, They love to be entertained so I’m going to go out there and entertain, that’s what I do best. I had a chance to go to japan before and compete and entertain the people it was an unbelievable turnout and I’m pretty sure this is going to be another unbelievable turnout.”
On that occasion Mayweather dismantled Tenshin Nasukawa in a brutal mismatch. Asakura has no previous experience of competitive boxing and the American believes his opponent will be feeling extremely nervous,
“When I’m going out and facing these different opponents to me they’re just an opponent but to them I’m Floyd Mayweather so, no matter what he (Asakura) does to psyche himself up, believe me he’s very nervous. Every fighter is nervous when they’re fighting Floyd Mayweather because you know when your facing Floyd Mayweather you’re facing the best.”
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New test
Mayweather turned 45 earlier this year but still loves the limelight. Despite his opponent’s complete lack of boxing experience the 15 time world champion says he is still motivated by the challenge of travelling to a new country to test himself against a younger man,
“It’s always good to go out and test your skills even when you get older, to test your abilities against another young fighter.”
