"Life's but a walking shadow, a poor player,
That struts and frets his hour upon the stage,
And then is heard no more. It is a tale
Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury,
Signifying nothing."
In Macbeth, Act 5, Scene 5 by William Shakespeare
As predicted, Mayweather knocked it out of the park. Mayweather controlled it from the 4th. The discipline of boxing is much purer than MMA and McGregor showed his novice skills early. I liked the way Mayweather just put his gloves up and went inside like a relentless zombie attack. Conor just couldn't figure that one out and had no power inside. He was drawn into a trap and he was dumb and greedy enough to fall for it. His cash mattress will cradle him tonight though, soft and luxurious enough to sooth his bruised ego. If Federer retires I’ll try to convince him and the then Badminton or table tennis world champion to play the Ultimate Tennis Match at Wimbledon’s centre court. This wouldn’t be more ridiculed than this "fight" or shall we call it scam. The only thing that made it vaguely interesting was that McGregor is younger, stronger, faster and able to verbally sell a fight, but it showed that experience, conditioning and ring craft can be more important attributes in a boxing bout.
Haha, what a pack of smart of fleecing sheep. Paid $200 m as a 5 weight world champ to beat a guy who doesn't box in a boxing match while the guy who doesn't box gets $75 m to be beaten by a guy who would never box him in the first place if it wasn't just a joke to earn folk half a billion for a half hours work. When folk just hand over that amount of money to see the inevitable happen in a silly paint by numbers fashion rich men who think the "hoi polloi" nothing but sheep to be fleeced will always exist, they'll abound in fact. And more will be created daily by folk handing them fortunes for doing absolutely zip. Well done those men. Half a billion+ to share among all, half an hour's work & some gunning in front of a press conference & there's half a billion+ lads. Well done, nice work if you can get it & have fools back it to the hilt. Last time Mayweather had to fight a guy with a bust shoulder & got $100m, this time fights a guy who is not even a boxer & he gets $200m. Great work if you can get it. But you really would have to question anyone who'd back it with their money hoping to see something other than a joke bout too secure half a billion+ from fools for half an hour's work ;)
It’s neither Mayweather nor McGregor I blame. It’s the media that sold this scam to the public as something like a regular boxing match. What next? Elton John running the 200 metres against Usain Bolt both singing "Like a candle in the wind"?
Now that it's done and dusted it is clear now how it could have been a much more interesting fight. Mayweather had a fight plan for the long haul while Conor's plan, if he indeed had one, was simply to hope that his strength and energy would last 12 rounds. It could have been much more interesting if Conor's plan was based on the much more likely scenario that his stamina could not last much more than about six rounds. This might have led to Conor adopting a 'knockout-before-round- seven' strategy which basically would mean that if that didn't work he would go out on his shield. In other words, a knock out or bust strategy. Mayweather would have been forced to engage much more in the early rounds if Conor had put his shoulder behind his punches early on. But all that is conjecture. Or maybe that was McGregor's strategy, he just couldn't deliver. He went hard at it in the first three rounds. The fourth, Mayweather had seen all he needed to and slowly started to come out. By the end of the fifth McGregor was physically spent. Mayweather just gave people a bit of value for money. He could have taken down McGregor anytime from the fifth, he had nothing left.
Bottom-line: What a farce. It was like watching a mix of Boxing and Wrestling. At one point, even the ref said "this isn't wrestling guys". I have never laughed so much watching a boxing match. Because of Conor's unorthodox boxing style Mayweather kept turning his back and Conor would resort to clubbing him in the back of his head. If this had been another boxer no doubt he would be disqualified. When Mayweather decided to up the ante, McGregor was just a punching bag. Could the ref had let it play out longer? Possibly. But McGregor was out and that would have just extended his punishment. All in all it's as the "experts" predicted- a mismatch with the boxer coming out on top. I got the sense Floyd was toying with McGregor for the people who had paid. But this is a failed experiment. A Moto GP rider won't come to F1 and blow the timing screens. Hope both sports and others learn from this.
What's next?
Mayweather vs. Sumo champ?
Myaweather vs. Wayne Rooney?
Mayweather vs. Mike Tyson?
Mayweather vs. Hulk Hogan?
Mayweather vs Trump?
Mayweather vs Oprah?
