Boxing News And Floyd Mayweather-Conor McGregor Nostalgia | BFW Preview Podcast

It's another light week for fights in the ring but we have plenty of news and some GREAT nostalgia involving "Money' Mayweather, etc. on the "Big Fight Weekend Preview Podcast!"

Host T.J. Rives returns with insider Dan Rafael to start off Labor Day weekend with the insight and takes.

They tallk first about the only main event fight of note in the U.S. as it's the return of Sadam Ali, 2008 US Olympian and former WBO junior middleweight titlist, on Sunday. He faces club fighter Cody Wilson in a 10-round junior middleweight bout in Detroit. Dan has more.

Then, we have news:

Turki Alashikh and his team looking to finalize a fight between lineal/WBO junior welterweight champion Teofimo Loepz and WBC lightweight titlist Shakur Stevenson, who would move up in weight, for a fight eyed for January. Is this the best move for Shakur? And, how realistic is this fight for the USA instead of Saudi Arabia?

Next, Turki and Ring announced launch of a new monthly boxing series on DAZN called “The Underdog.” The first card will take place Sept.11 at Fontainebleau Las Vegas ahead as part of Canelo-Crawford fight week. Opening show will be headlined by Anthony Olascuaga defending the WBO flyweight title vs. mandatory challenger Juan Carlos Camacho. We have the latest

Heavyweight Dillian Whyte said he plans to continue boxing despite suffering a harsh first-round knockout loss to Moses Itauma on Aug. 16. T.J. compares him to another heavyweight that like Whyte is more famous for being knocked out by prominent fighters than anything else.
 And, promoter Sampson Lewkowicz, bidding on behalf of Premier Boxing Champions, won Tuesday’s purse bid for the IBF final heavyweight title eliminator between Efe Ajagba and Frank Sanchez. Dan explains whether this fight will actually happen or not?

 Then, we have good Nostalgia
August 26, 2017 – 8 years ago on Tuesday – Floyd Mayweather TKO10 Conor McGregor as Floyd ended a two-year retirement to handily stop McGregor, who was crossing over from UFC to boxing, in the second-biggest money fight ever. Big Dan was ringside and recalls all of the circus leading up to the fight. Plus, the fight made TONS of $$ and Mayweather became 50-0. We discuss it in detail.

Hear it all on the "Big Fight Weekend Preview" and follow/subscribe to this podcast feed on Apple/Spreaker/Spotify, etc.

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:05):
The countdown is on to fight time. This is Big
Fight Weekend. Now here is your host DJ Leaves. Well,
we get ready for a holiday weekend in the United States,
and we're never gonna lie to you on the Big
Fight Weekend podcast if there ain't a whole lot going
on in terms of what's in the ring. Nevertheless, we

(00:25):
were not gonna stip this. We were not gonna not
be here this weekend in some form, in some fashion.
We are here. I am merely the somewhat capable host. TJ.
Reeves are insider cantankerous as ever is Big Dan Rayhiel
Fight Freaks Unit is the substack in the newsletter? Why
are you not subscribed? Why are you not getting the info?
The deats. Good to be back with you. We got

(00:48):
all kinds of plans going on, all kinds of college
football happening this weekend. Missus Reeves' birthday coming up soon,
Labor Day Holiday, Tonsdowne's birthday. This was your birthday, which
we'll get into in a moment. Tons happening. Just not
a lot in the ring. Thank you for finding us. Typically,
this is the preview pod of record where we would

(01:11):
go over all the voluminous big time cards in the
United States and elsewhere. Not a whole lot happening this
weekend for various reasons. Make sure you're following subscribing on
Apple's preaker Spotify. Whenever we go into the weekend, shall
we just tell them up front we're good? But how
do we do a recap podcast when there ain't a
lot to recap? So? Are we are we taking Labor
Day off? Are we calling it your birthday? What are

(01:34):
we doing? Why don't we just peeps? We will be
back when the fights are back here in early September
and we're building the Canelo and Crawford. But you savages,
do something with your families. What do you say, call
your mother?

Speaker 2 (01:47):
I call you, call your mother.

Speaker 1 (01:49):
Do something with it, Go socialize, get out of the house,
put the cheetos down with the keyboard, and go do
something this weekend, preferably like.

Speaker 2 (02:00):
I'd like to think they can be out doing things
while listening headphone.

Speaker 1 (02:05):
Now that's not to say that they don't have some
meat on the bone on this podcast, news wise and
nostalgia wise, we just don't have a lot to previews.
So we'll kind of take the holiday weekend off. The
weekend off and then come back rearing for September next week.
So thank you for finding us. All right, tell me
about the birthday, because you were telling me this before

(02:26):
I hit the record button. That young Rayfield in particular
had the sense of humor or was your wife? Was
Missus Rayfield also in on this?

Speaker 2 (02:34):
Well, she got in on it because my son was
taunting me. He's been taunting me for like almost the ever,
almost several months since I turned fifty five, that's right,
a few days ago.

Speaker 1 (02:47):
So you have joined me in the fifty five clubs.
Sammy Hagar approves of us. Are you ready? I can't
drive fifty five?

Speaker 2 (02:57):
I get it.

Speaker 1 (02:58):
And so a young Field was onto a gag with.

Speaker 2 (03:02):
You, and oh the well, we passed by like near
not too far from our house. They're like, I'm sure
a thousand communities around the United States there's an I
Hoop restaurant mm hm. And we've gone occasionally for like
a bronch or breakfast on the weekend or something like that.
And right in front you can't miss the damn sign,
you know, fifty five and older seniors.

Speaker 1 (03:22):
Man.

Speaker 2 (03:24):
So he's been taunting me knowing I'm gonna turn fifty
five that dad, soon you can be eligible to order
off the I Hop Senior menu, the senior menu. So
my wife thought that was hilarious also, so they busted
my chops about that, and so as a gag, I
mean partly for them that we're actually gonna go. I
wish you get IOPs as a sponsor for this freaking.

Speaker 1 (03:44):
Say should be right now, it should be.

Speaker 2 (03:46):
So we're gonna go this weekend because they bought for
like my quote unquote present, they bought a gift card
to I hop for how much DJ I would.

Speaker 1 (03:55):
Put predict fifty five dollars.

Speaker 2 (03:58):
Yes, sir, now I say this. They got a couple
other things also, but that was I understand.

Speaker 1 (04:04):
Let's say this a few years ago, probably ten years
ago or longer. You could do some serious damage, not
just in one sitting, but maybe on a couple of sittings.
Had I hoped for fifty five dollars.

Speaker 2 (04:16):
How I'm hopeful that breakfast for three can.

Speaker 1 (04:19):
Be How I'm not sure because now they're sur charging
for eggs. You've seen this, or they put like the
little addendum that we're charging you extra for eggs on
the menu.

Speaker 2 (04:28):
But I get the senior menu.

Speaker 1 (04:30):
So is it true. That's true. It might be tapered
off for you a little bit because of the senior man.

Speaker 2 (04:34):
I don't even know what's on the senior menu.

Speaker 1 (04:36):
I don't even have a gift card. And I was
not aware that they have a discount for the fifty
five and upcrowded I.

Speaker 2 (04:41):
Maybe maybe it's not maybe it's not a discoun maybe
it's just like a different thing.

Speaker 1 (04:44):
That well, you know, that presumably extra thing. The only
thing is there might be a qualifier that if you're
fifty five and up you have to eat between three
and five PM or something on the discount, like the
early bird special. Happy birthday to you. You you have
joined me. I took a picture in front of the
speed limit sign and put it up on social media

(05:05):
as fifty five, and I didn't put a caption. And
you would not believe how many knuckleheads that are friends
of mine on Facebook or peeps that follow me on
Twitter couldn't get the reference. No, I mean people couldn't
figure out why is TJ standing in front of a
speed limit sign that says fifty five? And then finally
two or three people figure it out and post on

(05:25):
the comments, and then everybody else joins saying, ah, you
figured it out, So that's what I did for fifty five.
Missus Reeves, however, would like everybody to know that she
is turning twenty nine once again. It's her anniversary of
her twenty ninth birthday for this weekend, all right, with
the pleasantries aside for our birthdays, etc. Report back to

(05:46):
us on how it goes at IHOP, et cetera. Again,
we gotta be honest with the audience. The only thing
that's really going on is the return of Saddam Ali
as a junior middleweight at about in Detroit this weekend.
And we care about this because Ali used to be

(06:07):
a bigger thing. Speaking of when I hoop was more affordable,
When I op was more affordable back back in the
two thousands, Saddam Ali was a little more known commodity
late two thousands, early twenty tens, et cetera. And he's
in the only real fight of record that's.

Speaker 2 (06:22):
I'm not even sure it's a real fight.

Speaker 1 (06:23):
The bottom line is, are they Here's the other thing
we're sitting here. Are they having the fight? Because you
said to me a few days ago, I'm not positive
they're having the fight, so we think they're having the fight,
but go ahead.

Speaker 2 (06:33):
So he hadn't fought for a while, they had him.
He announced a comeback fight earlier in the year, and
if reasons that were or maybe it was even at
the end of last year, reasons that were never explained
that the card was canceled. But I've been getting pressed
releases about the event. I've talked to the publicists. Apparently
it's happening taking place at the Wayne State field House
in Detroit, a place where Demetrius Alida has put on
some of his events and that sort of thing. Saddam

(06:56):
Ali is from Brooklyn. He's a two thousand and eight
United States Olympian. It was a great amateur fighter. As
a professional, he ended up winning a world title. He
sent Miguel Coto into retirement when he upset him to
win the WBO title. I was at that fight. It
was a huge deal. It took place at Madison Square Garden,
so Saddam Ali was able to you know, that was
Koto's house, but Saddam Ali was able to do that

(07:18):
in front of his you know, his hometown. I mean,
he's from Brooklyn. So even though most of the people
that are rooting for Coto with the Puerto Rican fan
base certainly was a huge deal for Saddam Ali to
win that fight. You know, that was obviously the end
of Miguel's career and he just walked away from the sport.
He had a great career, and you know, being honest,
obviously the the gel Coto at his absolute best is

(07:40):
going to without without a shadow of a doubt, he's
going to beat Saddam Ali. No disrespect to Saddam Ali,
but nonetheless that's what happened. He lost a competitive but
a decision. You know, it was like seven to five
eighty four on the scorecards, and so and then Saddam Ali.
You know, he continued to box. He lost the title
pretty quickly, but then he retired or you know, I

(08:03):
don't know if he just walked away or just decided
he was done with the sport, whatever it was. But
he hadn't fought since getting knocked out in the third
round by Anthony Young in twenty nineteen. He hasn't fought since.
So now six years later he's making his comeback. Says
he misses boxing. He has his own promotional company and
he's taken on a West Virginia club fighter. And you know,
not to stereotype, but if you see a guy with

(08:25):
a mediocre record or even a good record from West Virginia,
chances are you can say the same back Kansas and
Indiana and a few other places that don't exactly produce
top notch fighters. Yeah, so Cody Wilson is fourteen and
five with nine No one expects him coming off a
six year laft to take on a big opponent. So
that's what's going on.

Speaker 1 (08:43):
He said, old Ali, do we think thirty six years old?
Thirty six? Okay, he's not forty two. He's not what
was iikabayabucci when you were talking about.

Speaker 2 (08:51):
Two fifty two when Stadam walked away, he was still
a relatively young guy. You know, he was only barely
thirty years older. So when he call to a day,
so understood, and it's not he's not a guy that's
taken like crazy punishment. So he says he loves the
sport and we'll see what he can do. I mean,
you know, it is what it is, and it's the
kind of fight we probably wouldn't even preview anything else.

Speaker 1 (09:10):
Going on, but this is what there is.

Speaker 2 (09:13):
But I will say this Saddam's you know, I covered
a bunch of US fights. Nice guy at his absolute best,
was a heck of a good fighter, can do a
lot of things, had a good career. I don't know
if I would. You know, he's not going to be uh,
you know, in the Hall of Fame anytime soon. His
only losses were that young knockout and getting knocked out
by you know, the real up and coming Heimi Mungia
back in twenty eighteen, and also by Jesse Vargas who

(09:35):
had won a world title. I was at that fight
also when when Jesse won the vacant WBO welterweight title,
that was a huge deal. And I believe the reason
they go to Detroit is because Saddam Ali it comes
from a Muslim background, and there's a very big a
Muslim community in Detroit.

Speaker 1 (09:52):
And you go wherever they can put the fight on
and try to make a little money. And it's Labor
Day weekend. And we have now fulfilled the preview portion
of the preview podcast. We gave you what there is,
so now we move on to the news. All right,
So some busy stuff for Turkey Ala Sheik. His promotional
alarm as well as the Ring magazine, et cetera. So

(10:14):
the first thing is that apparently Teya Fimo Lopez and
Shaquur Stevens and there's some back and forth social media
stuff that's going on. What do we know and how
realistic is it that this can get made? What does
it look like?

Speaker 2 (10:26):
Oh, it's very realistic. They are. They are deep in
conversation about trying to finalize a fight that would see
the WBC lightweight champion, Shakuorra Stevenson move up from one
hundred and thirty five to one hundred and forty pounds
to challenge Tia Fimal Lopez, who is the lineal champion
as well as the WBO champion that won forty for
a fight between two of the better names in boxing

(10:47):
you know below Let's say like the guys that are
the big heavyweight names or the you know, the Canelos
and people like that. But if you're a boxing fan,
you certainly know Chakor Stevenson and Tia Fima Lopez for
their entire careers. Essentially they were promoted by top rank
who built them into champions and put them in higher
profile fights they have. You know, Shakur became a free agent,

(11:10):
ended up signing with Eddie Herney is now currently a
free agent once again. Tifi me Lopez while still part
of top rank from the standpoint of they still get
paid on his fights. He's really now with Turkey or
you know, doing his own thing. But if they can
make that fight, like, if they can get it done,
and I think there's a good chance it will get done.
I'm sure. Like everything, it's money, but whatever, if they

(11:31):
can do it, it's it's if it gets made, it
would most likely be eyed for the month of January
of next year. You know, if you take a look
at what's going on with the read season and the
ring magazine events that are happening, you know they have
there's not a lot of space left on the calendar.
Let's say to do it this year because they have
the huge card in November that we've discussed with David

(11:53):
Benavide's and Yard headlining in a mega show which also
has Bam Rodriguez and a unification and and and Brian
Norman again and Stuf Devin Haney and just a whole
bunch of good fights and Sam Noakes against Abdula Mason.
So that's the big card in November and then December
twenty seventh is supposed to be depends on obviously what
happens coming up in a couple of weeks. In a way,

(12:14):
is supposed to fight David Picasso in Saudi Arabia on
a on a Japan versus the World card. Obviously, as
Chakor versus Tia, Femo does not fit the theme of
Japan versus the World.

Speaker 1 (12:25):
So it makes sense that, I mean, it makes too
much sense and logic for boxing that shakur tea femo
is a sellable fight in the United States. Why would
you not try to have it? I realize it's the
READ season, but why would you not try to have
it in the United States in January or whatever?

Speaker 2 (12:39):
I mean, Look, I think that's probably part of the discussion.
I don't know that for a fact. I assume that
there's some of these bigger fights that for their reasons,
they like to have them in READ. But from a
geographic standpoint in terms of where their fans are. Look,
Chakorus from Newark, New Jersey, it's like ten minutes from
the you know, on the train to Manhattan. You know,
you take the train from there to station. You literally

(13:01):
get out at Madison Square Garden. Tiafimo was born in Brooklyn.
It makes perfect sense to do that fight, certainly at
Barclay Center or Garden. But again, you know they're gonna
go where the money is, so let's see if they
can get it done. I mean, I'm back to the.

Speaker 1 (13:14):
United States Tennis Center where Shakoor fought on the on
the card there and beat Williams of Paida, and they
had a good crowd and the whole bit. What doll
I know.

Speaker 2 (13:21):
Regardless of if they get the fight done, regardless of
where it takes place, whether it's in the United States
or it's in read that is an interesting fight because,
like I said, there are two of the bigger names.
Shakur look really good against the Paida. He would move
up and wait once again, he's already won world titles
at one hundred and twenty six, one hundred and thirty
and one hundred and thirty five, so he'd be going

(13:42):
for a title in a fourth way class. Tiafimo, while
has been inconsistent at times when we've seen him against
not necessarily the biggest name opponents, he has shined big
time when he stepped up and really faced the best guys,
like specifically against Lomachenko and Josh Taylor. So he's he's
risen to the occasion in his biggest fights. Your court
would fall into that category of that caliber of opponent.

(14:04):
This is not you know, a Steve Claggett type opponent.
You know, just you know, a.

Speaker 1 (14:08):
Decent guy hitting.

Speaker 2 (14:09):
No, I'm not knocking Steve flagging. I'm just saying this,
this is the kind of fight that I could see
Ti Femo rising to the occasion for compared to some
of the times when he's maybe fought down to the let.

Speaker 1 (14:20):
The only that I have is Shakur moving up in
weight again because he originally was a featherweight, right, and
then he's now been at lightweight for a couple of fights,
and now you're moving up again to junior lightweight. Does
the punching junior waltaw excuse me, does the punching power translate? Well?
But still you've got to be able to move the

(14:41):
other guy with your shots moving up.

Speaker 2 (14:45):
I think that of course, Stevenson, because of his skill
set and his defense and his speed, will have no
problem one hundred and forty pounds because he's never known
as a big puncher and tia Fimo. Lopez is not
the biggest guy. He doesn't burst at the seams in
that weight division, and he has shown to me anyway,

(15:06):
while he scored some very highlight reel type knockouts in
the smaller weight classes at one hundred and forty pounds,
still a really good boxer obviously act of a fighter,
but not a puncher at all. So I know I'd
be interested in that fight for sure. I mean, that's
two really good I would too, but you know, let's
see if they can get.

Speaker 1 (15:21):
Get to the realism meter on that.

Speaker 2 (15:23):
Now.

Speaker 1 (15:23):
What we do know is coming up that Turkey Alashka
and the Ring have announced this new monthly boxing series
called The Underdog. You made reference to the card when
we were talking about how the Jarrell Miller Michael Grant
fight is not going to happen on September the eleventh
in Las Vegas, two days before Canelo and Crawford. However,
there is a card that is going ahead and it

(15:45):
has a title fight on it. So elaborate more on
what's going on.

Speaker 2 (15:48):
Here, right, I mean, this has been a rumored fight
for a while. I don't know if they were going
to do Jerald Miller and Hunter on this card or
do what this said, Like originally they were talking about
doing multiple events the course of the days leading up
to it, So maybe that would have headlined one card
and whatever and then this other one to launch this

(16:08):
underdog series. In any event, we know that Jere Miller
and Michael Hunter is not happening, but this is this
is a card where they're gonna have some prospects on it.
There are fifty to fifty is type of fights, but
the attraction on this card is the is the main event.
It's taking place at the Font and Blue in Las Vegas,
which is the post hotel if you will, of Crawford
and Canelo, even though I don't think like Canelo is

(16:30):
staying there, but that's where the undercard got. I guess,
well that's not surprised. A lot of times those guys
stay at other places. But like the promoter folks, some
media folks, some you know, people involved logistically, the press
room is there. They're having I think, like the undercard
workouts there, that type of thing, so that'll be like
the hive of activity. Anyway, they'll do this fight card there.

(16:51):
And anyway, the interesting thing about the card is the
main event to me. While I said there's some other
prospect the type guys on the show, we have the
excellent young flyaway WBO champion Anthony Olas Gagua, and we
know him well because I don't know how close attention
you paid. He is one of the guys that fought
on many of those cards in Japan that would wake

(17:12):
up at four or five o'clock in the morning to watch.
So he has been fighting on a regular basis in Japan.
So he's from Los Angeles. He's an American fighter, but
he's coming back to do this fight. He's had his
last like four or five fights that have taken place
in Japan, and he's, you know, coming off of fight
in Japan in March where he defended the title against

(17:33):
Heroto Kayagucci's now he's fighting his mandatory challenger, which is
Juan Carlos Camacho. It's a twelve rounder for his title.
And you know, like I said, he's a really good
young fighter. He's nine and one. He has the one
knockout loss, a very forgiveble loss. When he challenged Kinciro
Taraji for the WBC title back in twenty twenty three.
He went nine rounds with him and got stopped, but

(17:54):
he's looked really good since then, and now he's got
a chance to fight in his home country against his
invatory challenger. So that'll be the main event of that card,
and it's again it's the main event of a card
that is meant to sort of compliment all the boxing
activity and all the boxing excitement and conversation that will
take place in Las Vegas in and around the big show,

(18:16):
which is obviously a couple of nights later with Canelo
Alvarez and Terrence Crawford. And that was always one of
the things I've enjoyed so many times over the years
of going to Vegas for many many years, not always
now this is obviously being done in conjunction with the
same folks that are putting on the Crawford and Canelo fight.
But tej I can't tell you how many times in
the past you go to Vegas for whatever the big
card was. It could be a big an HBO or

(18:37):
a showtime pay per view card, or whatever the magnitude
of the event was, and inevitably there would be other
shows on other nights in and around the city because
they knew that boxing bands were going to congregate that,
so they'd have a card in a ballroom or they
have a card here at this casino or there. I mean,
I can tell you I can remember very specifically back
in one of my first really really big fight cards

(18:59):
I did in Vegas was Felix Trinidad against Fernando Vargas,
which to this day, to me is still the greatest
junior middleweight world championship fight in the history of the division.
They fought an unbelievable fight. But so that was the
highlight of the weekend. That was the big mega fight
on the Saturday night. But I went to cards on
Thursday night, Friday night, two cards on Friday night, and
then another card on Sunday, Like I did like five

(19:19):
shows in like four days week for real.

Speaker 1 (19:22):
Because people understood, all right, built in fight crowd here
for the weekend. Take advantage of the built in fight
crowd and put a show on that'll make you some money. Yeah,
that would be would make you mega money.

Speaker 2 (19:34):
But you had you had Don King did like a
show a few days before that card. You had ESPN
had their Friday Night Fights card on the Friday night
in one of the big ballrooms at the MGM Grand
On Saturday, you had HBOUH did its card or no,
I take that back. On Friday, ESPN did the Friday

(19:55):
Night Fight Show, and then later on Friday night, HBO
did a Boxing after Dark card Boxing Every Dark cart
with the double header involving Marco, Antonio Barrera and Bernard
Hopkins together on the same show, all to build up
to Saturday night, which was the big show with Trinidad
and Vargas. And then on Sunday. This is back when
Top Rank was doing their Sunday afternoon on Univision cards

(20:17):
that were weekly, and they did a card downtown at
the Plaza Central Hotel that I actually went to even
though I was dead tired. And the reason was because
the guy that became a lightweight champion, Julio Diaz, boxed
on that card in the main event, and I was
gonna pick him as the prospect of the Year in
two thousand as long as he won the fight and
I was gonna do an interview with him. I went

(20:38):
to the show, he won the fight, that did the interview,
and he became the prospect of the year and ended up,
you know, winning two world titles. So but that was
maybe the extreme of having that many events, but often
times when there was a big show Friday night, fights
would be in town. On Friday night, there might be
a smaller showtime card on Friday night. There might be
a card on a Saturday afternoon. I remember going to

(20:58):
like an NBC card that main events did the day
in the afternoon of a day lo.

Speaker 1 (21:03):
I will tell you this that in the eighties uh,
and again we didn't cover the sport. We watched the sport.
But in the eighties, I do know this, they would
have a network TV CBS, ABC, NBC, a network TV
card a lot of times would be taking place on Saturday,
sometimes on Sunday, and then they'd have one of those
huge fights that was closed circuit before pay per view,

(21:27):
like on the Monday Tuesday, because they figured everybody's already
there blah blah blah. They would do that all the time.
So it was common. It was common, but not as
not as common now.

Speaker 2 (21:36):
It has become less over the years. But I'm glad
though that because there are going to be a ton
of people that come to the Vegas UH for this
event that if they're if they're boxing fans, there'll be
other opportunities to go to a fight card where you know,
the tickets are not as expensive. You can get a
great seat in a smaller venue. See what I think

(21:59):
on paper? Okay, it's sexy like Crawford and Canelo. Obviously, no,
but if you see like a good, nice little world
title fight, see some young prospects in action, you know,
and just sort of keep everything moving. So I'm glad
they're doing this type of show, and you know, we'll
see if I would unfold. But in terms of the
matchups that it looks like for this first event, uh,

(22:19):
seems like a pretty good shot out of the gate.
I'll put it to you like that, all right.

Speaker 1 (22:27):
So you did mention Don King, by the way, in
all of that, and you forgot to mention that you
were buzzing along this week in receipt of your I
Hop gift card. You also got a birthday well wish
from the gang.

Speaker 2 (22:41):
Yeah, I got listen, I got birthday well wishes from
a lot of folks in boxing. But I was surprised
that was like a day or two after my birthday
where I got a message from Don wishing me happy birthday.
But Don's birthday was a few days earlier and I
had I had texted Don happy birthday also, so I
think it was just kind of returning the favor. I
think what happened was the WBC, which they do this
on a regular basis, like every day when they do
a thing, they always like put up these little things

(23:03):
of like boxing people and what their birthdays are could be,
you know, fighters and other people involved in the sport. Writers,
you know, managers, promoters, you know, you name it. And
so they put a little thing with my picture happy birthday.
So I think a lot of boxing folks saw that
and reached out. I got some nice messages from some
fighters I've covered in some other boxes, so that was nice,
including Don King.

Speaker 1 (23:22):
How about that?

Speaker 2 (23:22):
All right?

Speaker 1 (23:23):
Moving along on the news, you did write about this.
I do read my Dan Rayphiel Substack. You should too, peeps.
Dillian White has announced he wants to fight on after
being wiped out in less than two minutes by Moses
Etama earlier this month. All right, Okay, I don't I

(23:46):
don't know. I mean, he's not going to be a
main event fighter anymore. I don't think it.

Speaker 2 (23:50):
Depends on the level of show. If he goes with
some smaller promoter. He probably would be on the main event,
but not making the kind of money he's used to making.

Speaker 1 (23:56):
True.

Speaker 2 (23:57):
But the bottom line is he went on his social media,
you know, because he didn't do an interview after the fight.
Understandable he got knocked out pretty roughly. I don't eat
into a press conference of my knowledge, and so he
hadn't really been heard from a post fight at least
not to the public anyway. And he posts on his
social media on Monday of this week that and I
quote this was like on his Instagram, this is not

(24:17):
where my story ends. I may have lost this fight,
meaning to Atama, but not the fire that built me.
Thank you to everyone who's been standing by me through
the highs and lows. I'll be back, So at least
I'll say this. At least he took a few days
or a week or so to think about it. What
always puts me off not that they're doing it like
they're going to intentionally lie about or this or that,

(24:40):
But it's when a guy makes a big time declaration
either I'm gonna fight again or I'm going to retire
in the ring, or even at the press conference, you know,
ten minutes a half an hour after the fight, at
least in Dylan's posting of this message, presumably over the
last several days since he got knocked out, that he
thought about this to some degree that made the decision

(25:00):
He's going to come back. Now, you'd say why, I mean,
it seems to me he's sort of at the end
of the road. That was a very rough knockout to
go out like that in one round, and especially because,
as we discussed quite a bit in the lead up
to the fight, he had showed up for the fight
in really superb condition compared to what not that he
was out of shape necessarily but in other fights, but
he was seventeen pounds lighter for this fight compared to

(25:21):
the December fight. He was at his lightest weight since
a fight in twenty twelve, and his two hundred and
forty four pounds, he looked good physically, and he just
gon hang with mosesy Toman. Now, obviously, any comeback is
going to be predicated on the opponent. Can Dylan White
still beat a bomb, Yeah, pretty sure he could. But
is he going to go in there and defeat the
top level opponents. I don't know about that now. What

(25:43):
I hope is he is going to come back. They
match him up with somebody that's not a young stud
and that's not a top Match him with your own contemporary,
somebody that might make at least a back and forth
kind of fight, and see what he means.

Speaker 1 (25:56):
I think the sun is setting and this was like
his last chance to do something. The one thing. Speaking
of the eighties, here we go back to it. I
was just thinking when you were detailing all of this
that Jerry Cooney had such a prominent rise as the
Irish white heavyweight and the great White Hope and the
whole thing. And in the end, Jerry Cooney is most

(26:16):
known for being knocked out three times I think by
Larry Holmes, by Michael Spinks, and by George Foreman brutally
in the last knockout. I'm just gonna say, I mean,
he's got all kinds of other baggage with failed drug
tests or whatever, but Gillian White's gonna build mostly be
known for being knocked out by Anthony Joshua, Alexander Povetkin,

(26:39):
Tyson Fury, and now Moses Etama. That's what he's gonna
be known for.

Speaker 2 (26:43):
Oh and Jerry Cooney's defense, Yes, he is known for
those losses because they were on against bigger name opponents.
But when I think of Jerry Cooney, not only do
I think of the Homes fight and that drive by
uppercut knockout to Foremant, but I think of the devastating
first round knockout that he drilled Kenny North with.

Speaker 1 (27:00):
And yes it was brutal, but in fairness, Norman was
Norton was long shot.

Speaker 2 (27:05):
I get that, but Norton was a former champion in
a well known tier okay names. But here's what I
was gonna say about that. When I thought about what
Moses Thoma did to Dylan White, in some respects, Moses
Thoma is the Jerry Cooney character and Dylan White is
the Kenny Norton character. You got the young guy Cooney.

(27:25):
This was his first real guy. He was supposed to
be fighting a big name in Ken Norton, Madison, Square Garden,
a lot of attention on HBO, like a big deal.
He had not thought anybody at this point. This was
considered a huge step up for Cooney, and he went in.
He scored one of the most blistering, fucking, oh yeah,
devastating knockouts. He'll see now but it was more.

Speaker 1 (27:44):
Again, I'm just saying it was more about Norman. Norman Norton.
You said Brian Norman earlier in the show. It's on
my brain. Ken Norton couldn't get out of the way
almost of you and me at that point. He's certainly.

Speaker 2 (27:57):
I'm not saying they're the same. I'm making the point
that it's a similar scenario with the big name, well established,
popular heavyweight against the guy that's supposed to be the
next big thing, and in this case, after Cooney did
that to Norton, now you fast forward like I don't know, like.

Speaker 1 (28:12):
Forty years right, and it's.

Speaker 2 (28:14):
The young Tom on the rise who's fought absolutely nobody,
who gets in the ring with the you know, the
wiped the well known veteran who's been in the ring
with everybody and just pummeled the crap out of him
in one round. So very similar.

Speaker 1 (28:27):
So we go nostalgic right there.

Speaker 2 (28:29):
That was part of our talking points. That was but
I just just made me think of that.

Speaker 1 (28:33):
There you go. One more news item before we go
full on nostalgia with Mayweather and McGregor anniversary. That is
Samson Lukawitz has.

Speaker 2 (28:42):
Announced, well he did not announce it.

Speaker 1 (28:45):
Well, the IBF announced it correct that he has gotten
he has won the purse bid.

Speaker 2 (28:50):
Actually nobody announced it was Rafael knowing the person was
scheduled for Tuesday, sending a.

Speaker 1 (28:55):
Wait a minute, all right, So the purse bid was
this past Tuesday and the IBF didn't even announce who
won the purse bid.

Speaker 2 (29:01):
I'm caring they they don't announce it. You know when
the purse bids are because you get the copies of
the letters from different people in the business. I keep
it on my calendar. I knew the perspid was scheduled
for Tuesday.

Speaker 1 (29:10):
I thought they Typically a lot of these organizations would
say so and so won. The point IBF does not
do that.

Speaker 2 (29:16):
I mean if I email, if I emailed my people
at the IBF and say hey, what happened, they'll be
very cordial and find and nice and get back in
a fairly quick order to say what happened. But the
bottom line is this pers bid for a final eliminator
between FAA Jagua and Frank Sanchez and the heavyweight division
to produce the eventual mandatory for Alexander Usik was scheduled
for Tuesday. It always is at twelve o'clock noon, and

(29:38):
so a few minutes after twelve o'clock noon, I sent
out text messages to different people that I knew would
be involved, and I was responded to and said this
is what happened. So that's what occurred. So Samson Lukewitz,
who was bidding that he works very closely with PBC
on a lot of different fighters. He was bidding on
their behalf, so he bid three hundred and two thousand dollars.

(29:59):
And which is the promoter for FAA Jagua. Carl Moretti,
who was the vice president of Top Rank, who actually
lives very close to the IBF offices in New Jersey.
They do these purse bids. You can either show up
in person or do it on as a like a
zoom call or some video conference. Carl went to the
purse bid and he on behalf of Top Rank, offered
two hundred and ten thousand dollars. So Samson wins the

(30:23):
purse bid. It's a sixty to forty split in favor
of a Jagua, who was the higher rated fighter, even
though Sanchez back four years ago beat a Jagua when
they fought each other at the time, two up and
comers on the undercart of the third fight between Tyson
Fury and Deontay Wilder. But they've had obviously fights since then,
so that was the winning did three to zero two?

Speaker 1 (30:44):
Now, I thought a Jagua was already the number one
and in the position. So what is this about the
having to have the fight with Sanchez? This is old
hermit to validate it again that he's the top fighter.

Speaker 2 (30:56):
No, no, TJ. How many times we got to go
over this? Just because you get to number one doesn't
mean you're mandatory. Okay, So now what happens to me?

Speaker 1 (31:05):
Okay, okay, hold on, you're insulting me. You're insulting me
with how many times do we have to go over this?
Most boxing fans check out when we talk about how
the number one guy isn't a mandatory challenger.

Speaker 2 (31:20):
For you, let me finish the comment. You'll understand I've
heard you before.

Speaker 1 (31:24):
But in the.

Speaker 2 (31:25):
IBS, if you achieve the number one status, they'll order
a mandatory eliminator to determine who is going to be
the next mandatory challenger. We went over this with Bcoli.

Speaker 1 (31:36):
And let me and let me share with you.

Speaker 2 (31:38):
Time out if you time out. Then they just give
the number one challenge right the spot.

Speaker 1 (31:43):
And I do remember that they were supposed to have
this eliminator fight where they not with Bacoli and with
a Jagua and Bacoli instead chose to fight Joseph Parker
on like thirty six hours notice and got knocked out. See,
I do remember these things. I do buy a requirement
have to sit and listen to you go on and
on about that.

Speaker 2 (32:01):
You don't want to talk about it. We won't talk
about it.

Speaker 1 (32:03):
No, No, I'm with you. I'm just saying I thought
we already settled that a Jagua was no guy, but
we haven't settled it.

Speaker 2 (32:09):
The reason why is because then we went over this
when a Jagua was willing to take the fight, but
Bacoley took the Bacoli fight and got knocked out properly,
and then they tried to reschedule the Ajagma fight. The
IBF was like, they can go do whatever they want,
but we're not going to sanction it for the eliminator.
When the dudes coming off a KO one number one,
you you went against the PERSPID timeframe, which is clear

(32:31):
as day, and every miss of the IBF says that
you can't fight within sixty days before the actual bout
if you're going to stay involved in the PURSEPD fight.
So they were getting paid good money in Saudi Arabia.
So so a Jagua and Bocoli fought and it wasn't
going to be the mandatory eliminator and a Jagua won
where they get a draw, I think if I'm not mistaken,

(32:52):
and so they now they went down their rankings and
this is what they came up with. It's not that complicated.
The bottom line is Frank Sanchez and that f THEA
Jaga fought a shitty fight four years ago, that was terrible,
and now they're both in position again. And that's why
the perspin number was so low, because nobody wants to
see the fight, but PBC put up the money for it,
and so presumably, look, Frank Sanchez is only entitled under

(33:14):
the perse bid because he gets a smaller share one
hundred two eight hundred dollars a job was supposed to
get one hundred and eighty one thousan two hundred. Now
he may think that's very small money after making like
about a million dollars against Bocoli, but Frank Sanchez has
a minimum with PBC the same way if Top Rank
had not lost a PERSPIT and they were doing the fight,
they would owe him a minimum. So Sanchez will get

(33:36):
taken care of from PBC because they owe him no
matter what the perspid number is.

Speaker 1 (33:40):
But the question is one may look at this and
say that's not nearly enough.

Speaker 2 (33:43):
Now right, Maybe he'll maybe he'll take the fight, and
if he does, then PBC most likely again not that guaranteed.
They still got to send the contract and go through
the whole process of getting that sign but most likely
you'll see Sanchez. As I was told by one PBC person,
if a jog that takes the fight, they probably would
put it on one of their upcoming shows as like
a preliminary on the free preview, probably like October twenty fifth.

(34:07):
That might be slightly soon. That's the card that's not
announced yet but probably gonna get announced next week with
Fondora against Keith Thurman. I guess if that doesn't happen,
they're still planning to do another show in December that
will be potentially a Manny Paco Next Fight or something else,
but it could wind up on there, so they're going
to control that fight, and that's where it probably happened.
The purse bit stuff is annoying, especially when it's a

(34:30):
fight that nobody cares about. But it is what it is, all.

Speaker 1 (34:33):
Right, So that happened earlier this week. Stay tuned on
whether a Jagua and Sanchez actually fight. And if you
read between the lines with what you were saying, that
doesn't seem like enough money for a jagas the number
one contender, But who knows.

Speaker 2 (34:46):
But he also may say, what the heck else am
I going to do? No one else is gonna be
out there offering the money, and if you win the fight,
But if.

Speaker 1 (34:51):
You're him, if you're him, can't you also be holding
out for the possibility that you might end up fighting
for a portion of the heavyweight title or the vacant
IBF title any way, rather than taking a risk with Sanchez.

Speaker 2 (35:02):
No, because he pulls out, If he pulls out of
the purspet they'll drop him from the ratings.

Speaker 1 (35:06):
There's the ridiculous part of what's going on.

Speaker 2 (35:08):
No, but that's the rules. But here's rocking him.

Speaker 1 (35:10):
All the way out of the ratings.

Speaker 2 (35:12):
No, No, not dripping out of the ratings, but drop.

Speaker 1 (35:14):
Him low enough out of the one. Out of the one.

Speaker 2 (35:16):
Versus listen, they go through the process of the perspet
if you if you participate and you then back out,
they're not going to reward you by giving you the
title shot. That's just basic. Now, what he could hold
out for title shot or not is could somebody call
him up and say, hey, you want to fight mosesy Tama
for a million dollars mm hm, And maybe it won't
be a title shot, but you'll get paid really well. Yeah,
maybe there'll be some other fight that maybe Turkey wants

(35:38):
to make him against. You know, I don't know, pick
a pick a good. You know they they work with
a ton of have you weights a Joga has been
on some of these saudy cards. But he's coming off
the draw against Bokoli. You know, he got a nice
win before that against Vannello. You know, he's done a
pretty good job coming back.

Speaker 1 (35:54):
Would be fair to say if you were you were
just throwing out a number of million dollars. He hasn't
had a million dollar fight probably in his career.

Speaker 2 (36:00):
I'm sure I guarantee you got seven bus fight.

Speaker 1 (36:03):
No, okay, all right, fair enough, that's why he So
that makes you dubious that he would take this money
depending to fight Sanchez if it's that low.

Speaker 2 (36:10):
But you guess the guy that already beat him.

Speaker 1 (36:12):
All Right, stayed stay tuned if that fight actually happens.
With the heavyweights, we're always more intrigued by the heavyweights.
All right, you've been nostalgic already. And before we are gone,
it was eight years ago. As it turns out, it's
August twenty sixth of twenty seventeen. Believe it or not,
it's been a little bit since Floyd Mayweather took on

(36:33):
the UFC ultra megastar Connor McGregor, boxer versus MMA guy.
This is really one of the first prominent ones of
these that had happened. It was a humongous fight, and
you were there as Mayweather got the stoppage back that night.
Now in twenty seventeen, tell me all about the spectacle,

(36:55):
the build up. You were telling us earlier in the
podcast about the build up. McGregor was selling this thing
all over the place in the press, conferences, et cetera.

Speaker 2 (37:03):
So this was this was this whole thing. But first
of all, I maintainted this day that anytime there's a
fight that the Nevadication Commission turns down, they should look
at this fight and not have an excuse because they
actually approved this fight between the greatest fighter of his generation.
It was forty nine to zero and the pound for
pound superstar, even though he was coming out of a
two year retirement against a guy making his boxing professional debut.

(37:27):
It should again. I'll you know, it happened, and whatever
happened happened, but I'll die in the hell. In my opinion,
the fight never should have been sent. And this was
the Nevada State Athletic Commission wanting the event in Las Vegas.
I'm sure there was a lot of pressure from the
different business entities involved with this event, but nonetheless they
talked about this. They should talk to each other, you know.

(37:49):
I don't know if the people can google it. It
takes two seconds, you know. Connor McGregor showing up in March.
I guess it was earlier this year, or maybe I
guess it was this year. Maybe it was twenty sixteen.
I don't remember exactly what it was, but it was
several months before the fight happened. Showed up at Madison Square,
Garden in the theater on the night that is his
buddy and countryman Michael Conlin, the Olympic star made his

(38:11):
professional debut on a top rank card at the Madison
Square Garden Theater. I was there. It was the night
before a big triple G fight in the main arena,
and that was the night where Connor McGregor came running
to ringside right after the fight and got right in
my face and are you the Because a lot of
guys that were there covering it, he knew because they
covered boxing as well as MMA. But when he asked
one of the publicists, who's the boxing guy, and he

(38:34):
pointed to me, he came running out of the ring
and dropped down right in front of my spot in
the front row of the press section. You know, it
started shouting at me. I mean, I wasn't like scared.
He was kind of humorous. You know, are you the
boxing guy? On the boxing guy? And he went in
this whole tirade about how he's going to do damage
to Floyd Mayweather. It was caught on video viral. I
wound up in the in the sports.

Speaker 1 (38:55):
Why in your social Undia bio, you're referring to yourself
as Connor Gregor calling you the boxing gain.

Speaker 2 (39:01):
That is one hundred percent correct. So that's where that
time he went out to party. After that whole thing,
I was then asked to go like to a studio
in Manhattan, like two o'clock in the morning to do
some work on Sports Center at that time because it
became such a huge thing. Now you fast forward, however
many months later. That was in March because it was
Saint Patrick's day. So now we're here in August, I guess,
and the fight's happening now. Before the fight, they went

(39:22):
on that wild press tour all over the place, and
they put like twenty thousand people in arenas to watch
them march around the stage and do a quote unquote
press cards and cursed at each other and say bad
words and say very misogynistic things and violent things and

(39:42):
call each other names. It was very unenjoyable in mine
for me. Anyway, I was dispatched by my editors at
ESPN to go to New York City to cover the
press tour stop at the Barclay Center. Uh. And I
did that, and I was supposed to come home that
same night, but because they were supposed to have the
media availability for the two fighters before the formal thing.

(40:04):
That did not happen, so they actually waited until afterwards,
so I missed my train, had to get a hotel
and stay over. It was all big thing. But the
funny thing I remember about that is so Connor McGregor
and I had that thing with you know, the boxing guy. Nonsense,
however many months earlier. Now I'm sitting in the media
center or in the press room where they're doing the
press commerce for his media availability after the formal program,

(40:25):
and I'm sitting there in the front row and they say,
they give you the microphone, please identify yourself before you
ask your question. So I get the microphone and as
I'm about to like say, you know, I'm Dan Rayfield
from ESPN, Connor McGregor, who I'm sitting like five feet
from right in front of him. He looks at me.
He goes, oh, you're the boxing guy. Remembered the whole
incident from Madison Square Garden, you know, from however, many
months earlier. So we had a good laugh about that.

(40:46):
And now you fast forward to the fight. His was
the biggest fucking thing in the world. I mean, you
got the two biggest stars in their sport. Floyd's out
of retirement, he's looking to go fifteen. You know, Connor's
been talking shit how he's going to do this, that
and the other thing. He was massively popular with the
UFC and they had the fight. It was a gargantren.
Again there's intrigue.

Speaker 1 (41:04):
There's intrigue also in that in the timeline Mayweather had
fought Paki how but they had not fought for two
years and came out of retirement as you were, as
you referenced at the beginning. So that was part of
the build up of is he gonna be rusty? Does
MacGregor have a chance at a lucky punch? Is McGregor
gonna go nuts and try to put a choke hold
on him and tap him out?

Speaker 2 (41:24):
Like that was actually a big part of the lead up.
Is what's gonna happen if McGregor like forgets about the
rules and just resources for the UFC rules and the
and then their roles and like tries to take him
down or throw a spinning head kicker whatever they call
that shot. So this was at Team Mobile are in
a massive crowd, massive event, and remember if you go back,
this was in twenty seventeen. The Pacao fight had taken

(41:46):
place in twenty fifteen when they fought that fight, which
was not a Team Mobile that was at the MGM Grant,
but it set every conceivable revenue record in terms of
the overall gross, the pay per view, the sponsors, the
you know.

Speaker 1 (41:58):
The end they didn't make. What was the live gate.
It was just ridiculous the live gate.

Speaker 2 (42:03):
So this is the all time record for Mayweather pak Yao.
The first of all, the fight itself generated roughly six
hundred and fifty million total revenue, including the most ever
pay per views, which is like four point six million
on re gate. In ticket sales for the MGM grand
which by the way, holds about four thousand less people
than the Team Obi Arena, the gate for that fight

(42:25):
was over seventy two million dollars. Now, put that in perspective,
if you do a gate at Teamobile or MGM or
any big boxing event, if you hit twenty million, you're
a rarefied air.

Speaker 1 (42:37):
Right right, right, rarefier Because in and around that time,
like Canelo and Triple G fought in and around the
time of this McGregor.

Speaker 2 (42:45):
So i'll tell you what that and.

Speaker 1 (42:46):
That was like twenty five or thirty million or what
was it.

Speaker 2 (42:49):
The first fight? I forget the order, but one of
the fights was about twenty four million, the other one
was about twenty six.

Speaker 1 (42:54):
And again Pacquiao Mayweather was seventy two million dollars. That
is the correct game. So what was McGregor and Mayweather from?

Speaker 2 (43:01):
So I'm going to get to that. So that holds
all the records, and that was a fight that everybody
wanted to see for years and years and years. The
two best fighters of their era both massively decorated huge
pay per views all along over the years. Against all this,
you know, many many of the same opponents, including Oscar
de la Hoya, who put both of them over. Basically,
to use the parlance of the WWE. Mayweather McGregor though,

(43:23):
was such a mainstream event because you had the number one,
or at least the most popular fighter in the MMA
against the unretiring Floyd Mayweather, who was still you know,
loomed over the sport in many respects, and they put
on the massive fight. And while it didn't break the
records that Floyd did with Manny, this was on a
on a level that was like nothing else other than
Manny versus Floyd. This fight did four point three million

(43:46):
pay per views in the United States, second books ever
the gate meaning the ticket sales. I told you the
record is the seventh if you want to be exact,
seventy two million, one hundred ninety eight five hundred dollars
for Mayweather, PACYA, Connor McGregor and Floyd fifty four hundred,
fourteen thousand, seven hundred and sixty five dollars and seventy
nine cents.

Speaker 1 (44:05):
Do you have it down to the penny, Yes, sir.

Speaker 2 (44:08):
That is a.

Speaker 1 (44:08):
Boatload of money on a live game. When you consider
that the modern fights now struggle to get ten or
fifteen million, that's crazy.

Speaker 2 (44:17):
So so four point three million is still the second
most ever pay per view sales ever for any combat
event or any of them probably ever on pay per
view combat or otherwise. And the fight itself, why everybody
was sort of like, figure, Floyd's gonna win the fight
pretty handling. But you also had in the back of
your mind, like what happens if McGregor lands some kind
of big punch, you know, because Floyd has been out

(44:38):
of the ring for a while, And when the fight started,
a lot of people felt like Connor won the first
second round. I've always maintained that if you thought that
was the case, that was because Floyd was just there
to sort of like see what he had and let
him do what he could do, and just sort of
assess the situation that Floyd, if you wanted to, probably
could have started a lot quicker. So there was a
palpable sort of feeling in the crowd. I remember that,

(45:01):
oh my god, McGregor's doing well. He's winning the fight
after two rounds, and I kept thinking, like, dude, it
doesn't make a difference. As soon as Floyd decides to
start fighting, this fucking thing is over. And slowly but
surely Floyd picked up the pace and he had him
completely under control after like two three rounds, and eventually,
you know, Floyd's never been a big puncher against anybody,

(45:21):
particularly they're fighting at one hundred and fifty pounds or so.
Back when Floyd was fighting at a junior lightweight or lightweight.
You know, he's certainly at junior lightweight he carried more power.
But in the end, you know, he just basically beat
him down and ended up stopping him in the tenth round.
And the good thing was a lot of people thought
that he carried him for a while, and even if

(45:42):
you subscribed that feeling, the good thing about this was
as much hype as this fight got. When people finally
left the arena or turn off their TV or their
screen or whatever they're reviewing it on, I don't think
anybody came away super disappointed because it was actually entertaining.
Now Floyd carried him. That maybe one of the reasons
why maybe you could end right.

Speaker 1 (46:02):
So I've told you this before, but I'll refresh you here,
and I've shared this when we've talked about it before.
I still vividly remember this. We're in the timeframe in
the month of August. We're in my fall work duties.
I do Tampa Bay Buccaneers Radio and their broadcasts, and
we're always playing preseason games on the weekends in August.
In this case, we don't have a preseason game this weekend.

(46:23):
The next thing for Labor Day. The next thing is
the regular season starting. But I still remember that night
we had finished up on what's called the network pregame show,
where all the stations are taking the network pregame show.
I had been asked to fill in and help out
on the post postgame show, Rayfield. So the post postgame
show is happening, and I had bought the pay per

(46:44):
view on my laptop, like what we're talking about right now,
And I still remember there was about six people crowded
around my laptop while I'm talking about the Buccaneer preseason game.
And I still remember during one of the commercial breaks,
after like the fifth or sixth round, I turned the
people that were around again, this is a preseason game,
the post postgame show. Who is listening to us, Rayphael

(47:06):
at midnight? After this, with the fight going on, I
turned to the guys around me and I said, he
is purposely trying to get him into the later rounds,
wear him out, and knock him out. I vividly remember
I told the group that the mute went back down
on the fight. I'm back doing the postgame show, and
that is eventually, I mean, I was not Nostra Damas.

(47:26):
That's eventually what happened, though. He got him into the
late rounds. War that was what.

Speaker 2 (47:30):
That was sort of like what like a lot of
people were thinking was gonna be when you get.

Speaker 1 (47:34):
That sense sitting there around four, five, six, He's gonna
get him into the later rounds.

Speaker 2 (47:39):
He said that he was just gonna play with him
until he tired him, and he was very accurate with
his punches. He didn't look like he had been off
for two years. He was also not fighting an actual
professional boxer. For purposes of to know how dominant he was.
On the score cards, he was at eighty nine to
eighty one going into the tenth round. He was at
eighty nine eighty two on the other score card. On

(48:00):
the third score card was I was up eighty seven
eighty three. That judge obviously had given Connor the first
couple of rounds of the fight, and I always get
a kick out of this. They obviously was not a
world championship, but it was a big deal. They fought.
The WBC created the money belt because this was called
the money fight, right because you know, take on money
whether and the money involved in the fight. So I
looked this up. It's actually on box wreck if you

(48:22):
if you look at their little wiki of the fight.
The vacant w WBC money Belt, consisting of one point
five kilograms of twenty four cared gold, thirty three hundred
and sixty diamonds, six hundred sapphires and one hundred and
sixty that's avy duty.

Speaker 1 (48:38):
What's the estimated worth of that belt. I think one
point five kilos of gold alone is worth thousands and
thousands and thousands hours.

Speaker 2 (48:47):
So it was a beautiful belt. Because the Malisia Sulimann
was sort of showing it around during the build up
to the fight, he would had a selfie.

Speaker 1 (48:55):
Selfies weren't big back in the late twenty times with
the belt.

Speaker 2 (48:59):
I think I have a photo of myself with that belt.

Speaker 1 (49:02):
Oh you gotta dig that up, get on social media,
all right. My question one final time, on all the
money every which direction. Was it a fifty to fifty
split or did Floyd get like seventy five or eighty percent?
You were talking?

Speaker 2 (49:14):
Ah, I don't remember what the split was, but certainly
Floyd got the lion's hair of the money. I mean,
he wouldn't have done the deal without it. But I
mean one of the reasons that made it was a
little bit difficult to make was because Connor at that
time was under contract the UFC, so he had to
do a deal with Dana White to allow him to
participate in the fight. So UFC obviously was paid on
the fight also, oh yeah, and Dana was part of
the promotion to some degree, which certainly helped it. Showtime

(49:37):
rolled out all the you know, all the bells and
whistles to put on the event, and it was just
a mega mega fight and Floyd wins the fight. He
retires fifty to oh. I still to this day, you know,
get people saying, well, he's not really fifty oh, because
the McGregor fight shouldn't have counted. Well, he does count,
whether you like it or not. So he finished his
career fifty and oh. He's obviously had a number of
exhibition matches since then, but the official mark goes down

(49:59):
fifty wins, zero losses, and twenty seven knockouts, and he
finished it off, you know, with gates.

Speaker 1 (50:06):
It up with the floodgates for different UFC fighters to realize, yeah,
I can make ten or twenty times more money by
getting into a big time boy.

Speaker 2 (50:13):
Nothing has ever come even close. The next biggest, not
close to that. Now, the next biggest crossover is probably
Francis and Nagano against Tyson Fury, and then France and
Nagano against Anthony Joshua, And those were huge fights financially
because Saudi and the Turkey paid them a tremendous amount
of money and there was obviously interest. But I still
as big as those were, I don't think they come

(50:34):
close in terms of the level of at least in
the United States anyway, the main surrounding this fight, the anticipation.
This was not just the boxing press writing about it
and the UFC press writing and talking about it. This
was mainstream like oh yeah, New York Times, not even
like boxing writing, but in terms of like a like
a lifestyle type story or you know, the scene type story.

(50:57):
You know, was on the sixty minutes. One of the
big news programs did something about I forget which one
it was, but this was just a huge deal. I
mean I can remember Pat Patyam Mayweather was the biggest
one ever. But like at ESPN, the amount of coverage
that we had was remarkable, Like we would have these
like calls with the teams, we had our little boxing group,

(51:18):
but then we're in with the MMA people also, you know,
and you got all of us on site together doing
our parts. You know, guys that covered MMA, guys that
cover boxing. Like I was like on the same like
a panel I got involved with doing things like I
was covering boxing for ESPN, and you know Ariel Hajwani,
he was not at ESPN an the longer. He's out
doing his own thing, but he was there doing MMA stuff.

(51:40):
So we had to collaborate on some certain things and
got to know each other bit working together. It was
all because of this fight, because it was such a mania.
And of course in the end, the greatest thing that
came from besides all the money everybody made, was I
got called the boxing guy by Connor McGregor.

Speaker 1 (51:55):
Pitting on all of that. All right, we did well
here for the Previos pod for the weekend, for Labor
Day weekend without a whole lot to preview. That's uh,
that's for sure. I will just say on once more,
shame on the organizations that don't have anything going in
the United States the last couple of weeks, in particular
the last two or three weeks something before we get

(52:17):
into the football et cetera. Not any of them took
advantage of it. So uh, we have what we have.
But we're here for you peeps. Anything else. In closing
birthday boy, are we good?

Speaker 2 (52:27):
We're good?

Speaker 1 (52:27):
Before you head off to I hop this weekend we
celebrate eventually Missus Reeves's birthday off of Labor Day weekend,
college football ongoing, et cetera. By the way, I should
make mention that while you and I have been recording
the podcast, you notice I've been a little distracted. You
notice I keep looking down, looking at the phone.

Speaker 2 (52:45):
I'm not taking that personally.

Speaker 1 (52:47):
Micah Parsons of the Dallas Cowboys got traded to the
Green Bay Packers while we were doing the pod. We
effort to bring you all the latest news and info
on the boxing pod. You're a Giants guy, and so good.
He's not in the division anymore. And Green Bay and Dallas,
I believe, do play each other.

Speaker 2 (53:05):
Coming up surprised because I just saw, like on YouTube
or wherever, I saw my man, Jerry Jones talking to.

Speaker 1 (53:13):
My house with Stephen A.

Speaker 2 (53:14):
Smith, right yeah, and he was saying, no way, know
how am I getting rid of? Right?

Speaker 1 (53:18):
Which as soon as that happens, start thinking, you start
thinking where's he traded him to? Because whenever they say
get Dallas got draft picks, two number ones and got
a player, got a defensive tackle from the Packers. So
some the Cowboy fans, I got two Cowboy fans that
are already going crazy on my phone saying not enough,

(53:38):
not enough. For Micah Parsons, who's on it seems it
does seem a little light, but I just say to
you that we aim to please. It's kind of a
lighter weekend, but the Cowboys kind of steal the weekend
with making that trade to the packers. The Cowboys and
Packers like our rivals going back sixty years. What is
Jerry doing helping the packers? All right, so we're off
the soapbox on that. Uh, my friend, have a good weekend.

(54:00):
We will take the weekend off piece, but make sure
you're following subscribing here go to the YouTube page Big
Fight Weekend YouTube page for all of our content. There
a lot of original content, nostalgia, live stuff. September, we'll
have a lot more on the YouTube page as well.
For now, we're good as part of the Big Fight
Weekend preview podcast, Everybody be safe on Labor Day weekend

(54:21):
for Dan Rayfield. I'm TJ. Reeves.

Speaker 2 (54:22):
Bye.