By:  | November 8, 2018 7:32 am

On Monday Rizin held a press conference to announce that Floyd Mayweather would be fighting Tenshin Nasukawa on New Year’s Eve. That fight will not be happening with the boxer taking to Instagram to explain the situation:

 

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Now that I am back on U.S. soil after a long and disappointing trip to Tokyo, I now have the time to address you, my fans and the media in regard to the upcoming event on December 31st that was recently announced. First and foremost, I want it to be clear that I, Floyd Mayweather, never agreed to an official bout with Tenshin Nasukawa. In fact (with all due respect) I have never heard of him until this recent trip to Japan. Ultimately, I was asked to participate in a 9 minute exhibition of 3 rounds with an opponent selected by the “Rizen Fighting Federation”. What I was originally informed of by Brent Johnson of “One Entertainment” was that this was to be an exhibition put on for a small group of wealthy spectators for a very large fee. This exhibition was previously arranged as a “Special Bout” purely for entertainment purposes with no intentions of being represented as an official fight card nor televised worldwide. Once I arrived to the press conference, my team and I were completely derailed by the new direction this event was going and we should have put a stop to it immediately. I want to sincerely apologize to my fans for the very misleading information that was announced during this press conference and I can assure you that I too was completely blindsided by the arrangements that were being made without my consent nor approval. For the sake of the several fans and attendees that flew in from all parts of the world to attend this past press conference, I was hesitant to create a huge disturbance by combating what was being said and for that I am truly sorry. I am a retired boxer that earns an unprecedented amount of money, globally, for appearances, speaking engagements and occasional small exhibitions.

A post shared by Floyd Mayweather (@floydmayweather) on

It appears that Mayweather was just as surprised as the rest of us when Rizin announced this improbable sounding fight. The boxer doesn’t sound too happy with the Japanese promotion, and Nobuyuki Sakakibara probably has some explaining to do given that fans reportedly rushed to buy tickets.

Whether or not Tenshin is on the December 31st card at the Saitama Super Arena remains to be seen. He is one of Rizin’s biggest draws and can compete under both kickboxing and MMA rules.

But Mayweather definitely won’t be there, putting an end to a brief and bizarre saga that caused worldwide headlines. The story is still in the news cycle with Conor McGregor being accused of racism for comments he made about Tenshin.