Connor McGregor vs. Floyd Mayweather Fight Update with Betting Odds
— Conor McGregor is the latest UFC fighter to call out a top level boxer.
— Now UFC President Dana White is involved trying to make the fight happen.
– Even most MMA fans realize that Mayweather would destroy Conor under boxing rules.
My ex-wife used to have a friend of a friend that would show up at just about every party we went to. Keep in mind that we were well into our thirties so by ‘party’ I mean ‘wine and cheese tasting’ and the like. This woman was in her 60’s and fancied herself some type of seriously spiritual being. In reality she’d taken a bunch of acid in the 1960’s and never recovered. She spent all of her time in places like New Mexico and Sedona, Arizona where ‘seriously spiritual beings’ all gravitate toward, at least in the Western United States.
The funny thing about her is that she *had* to be the center of attention. If someone was talking about their dog, she’d recount the time that a couple of spirit dogs appeared to her and led her through a ‘vision quest’. If someone had seen a UFO special on TV, she’d talk about the time she was abducted and shown the true meaning through life while on a week long peyote bender in Joshua Tree National Park. At one point, some one at a party was telling an amazing story–I can’t remember the details but at the time I recall thinking to myself ‘damn, that’s an amazing story’. The aforementioned woman stood up and blurted out apropos of nothing “I’VE TOUCHED THE HOLY GRAIL!’.
Which brings us to the fight sport version of this woman, Dana White. Although Dana has a famously prickly relationship with the media–and by ‘media’ I mean any press outlet that isn’t a fawning sycophant of the UFC President–he also can’t stand it when he’s not front and center in the media he claims to abhor. And why *would* he be ‘front and center’ in the media right now? We’re in the midst of Triple Crown racing season, the Stanley Cup playoffs, the NBA playoffs and baseball season. His own promotion is playing before an ever shrinking core group of serious fans. There’s a couple of stars that can ‘push the needle’ on buy rates but one is likely to retire soon (Ronda Rousey) and Conor McGregor is taking a break. Otherwise, buy rates are dismal with the UFC lucky to bring in 300,000 views for an average PPV. Not counting UFC 200 (which brought in a PPV buyrate darling of yore, Brock Lesnar) you have to go back to January 31, 2015 to find a buyrate over 500,000 for a non Rousey/McGregor headlined card. This is all assuming that the buyrates can be believed at all–there’s a lot to suggest that they’re ‘worked’ by the UFC and have no basis in fact. Even traditionally favorable media outlets are finally smelling the coffee that the UFC can’t create a new star to save their lives.
TIME TO PUT MCGREGOR V. MAYWEATHER BACK ON THE FRONT BURNER
In this context it’s not really a surprise that White went to the only card he had that brings about sure fire media attention–Connor McGregor v. Floyd Mayweather. At the press conference following last weekend’s lackluster UFC 211 event White happily proclaimed that he’d worked out an agreement with McGregor to fight Mayweather and that he was ‘right there’ in terms of finalizing the bout. McGregor was always the easy half of the equation. He claimed he’d wanted $100 million to fight the ‘pound for pound’ king but since he had never made more than $4 million for a fight in his career there was clearly a lot of ‘wiggle room’. Mayweather, on the other hand, won’t get out of bed for less than $25 million.
White’s increasing involvement in Mayweather/McGregor has been strange. Originally, the thinking was that the UFC would be the primary roadblock in preventing the fight from happening and would even litigate if necessary. The ‘party line’ is that White has realized that he can’t stop McGregor from doing it so he figures he might as well get a ‘taste’. Or maybe it’s the need for his promotion to bring in a quick influx of revenue to keep the new ownership group (WME-IMG) happy. The other rationale is that he’s doing this to keep McGregor–easily the UFC’s biggest box office and PPV draw–happy. Maybe, but it’s not like McGregor has a ton of options when it comes to competing MMA promotions. The Japanese MMA scene is sadly moribund at the moment and the US MMA scene is a virtual monopoly despite the presence of nominal #2 promotion Bellator. He could always get involved with the WWE or one of several Japanese MMA promotions but he’s got less experience at ‘worked’ fight sports than he does at boxing. New Japan would actually be a great career move for McGregor–it’s full of serious badasses like Pancrase co-founder Minoru Suzuki who could help him learn to ‘work’ a pro wrestling match while keeping his ‘tough guy’ persona intact. This would put him into a similar boat as Brock Lesnar who always had the WWE and other pro wrestling options as leverage with the UFC. This notwithstanding, he’s not got a lot of viable MMA options anywhere in the world.
There’s also little in White’s tone to suggest that McGregor will fare particularly well against Mayweather in a boxing match. White isn’t stupid–and if anyone thinks that McGregor can do what Arturo Gatti, Shane Mosely, Diego Corrales, Oscar De La Hoya, Carlos Baldomir, Manny Pacquiao, Juan Manuel Marquez, Canelo Alverez, Zab Juda, Ricky Hatton, Miguel Cotto, Marcos Maidana and Jose Luis Castillo (as well as numerous others) couldn’t and beat Floyd Mayweather under Marquess of Queensberry rules they’re delusional. For his part, Dana keeps bringing up the old ‘Mayweather would get his ass kicked in the octagon’ canard which is like saying that LeBron James would school Connor McDavid on the basketball court. So?
SO DOES MCGREGOR V. MAYWEATHER HAPPEN?
I doubt it. In my previous article on the subject I made the ‘No’ a -2700 favorite in a ‘Does the fight happen by 12/31/17’ prop. It’s more likely now, as much because the UFC has given their blessings than anything else. It’s a no lose proposition for Dana to force the issue. Either the fight does happen and he puts a big check in his pocket or it doesn’t happen and he can go around chortling about how Mayweather was ‘scared to fight’ a guy with no significant boxing experience. Mayweather is likely trying to determine if the interest is there to make it worth his while. He’d likely take a big cut of the PPV revenue (since I doubt that the UFC would guarantee what he’d need to take the fight) and if the fight doesn’t bring in the buys it isn’t worth his while. Personally, I don’t see the interest being there. No matter how bizarre the spectacle that’s not necessarily going to attract an audience to what will almost certainly be a non-competitive fight. No disrespect to McGregor but at its essence this is a matchup between one of the ‘pound for pound’ best boxers in history and a defensive master against a guy who has never had a professional boxing match.
CONOR MCGREGOR VS. FLOYD MAYWEATHER BETTING ODDS
Will Conor McGregor fight Floyd Mayweather before 11:59 PM Eastern on 12/31/17?
Yes: +600
No: -900
Who will win a boxing match between Floyd Mayweather and Conor McGregor (must take place before 12/31/17 for action)?
Floyd Mayweather: -2100
Conor McGregor: +1200