Early this month, many sports fans all around the globe gathered around to watch what was widely considered to be, “The greatest fight of this generation.” That might be the biggest misnomer of our generation. The fight was set for a twelve round main event at the Las Vegas MGM Grand Hotel between Floyd “Money” Mayweather and Manny “Pac-Man” Pacquiao. The two men are considered the best boxers of the Millennial generation because Mayweather was a perfect 47 wins and no losses entering the fight, and Pacquiao was thought to be the only man capable of knocking Floyd out. Pacquiao has the most knockouts in the common era of boxing with 38. It cost 100 dollars to watch the fight from home on pay-per-view, and the cheapest ticket to see the fight live was set at $3,500. It was supposed to be twelve rounds of the two best boxers of the common era slugging it out to prove who was the best, instead what was seen was two boxers well out of their prime dancing around the ring trying not to bust a hip.
Both guys just circled the ring and did not throw many punches at all. This resulted in the public being infuriated with the decision to watch the fight for such an absurd amount of money. In the end, Mayweather won to retain his undefeated title, but the fight did not prove anything. It did not show who was the better boxer, it showed what two men would do just to get a big pay day. “Big” is an understatement for the payout these two fighters got. For winning, Mayweather won $100,000,000 and Manny just got a measly $98,000,000 for losing the bout.
Days later, the public found out that Pacquiao had also given himself steroid injections for a lingering shoulder injury. Steroids in boxing are not illegal to heal injury, but he did not inform Mayweather he was doing it, so Pacquiao must face consequences for such actions. No one is sure how they will punish Pacquiao, but these actions will not go unseen.
In the end, the fight was not what the world wanted. Every fan wanted two guys pulverizing each other to prove who was the greatest, but that isn’t what they got. The fight was a dud, the sport of boxing lost respect, and the reputations of these two fighters were left tarnished. If this fight never happened, it would have been the greatest thing to never happen in the world of sports.
