During an appearance on ESPN’s “First Take,” Floyd Mayweather said he attempted to make a fight with Conor McGregor and offered him $15 million while he would rake in $100 million. Dana White caught wind of Mayweather’s comments and appeared on “The Herd” to counter the retired boxer with an offer of his own to make the dream fight come to fruition.
“Here’s a real offer: We’ll pay you $25 million, we’ll pay Conor $25 million and we’ll talk about pay-per-view at a certain number. There’s a real offer,” White said.
White’s offer is merely 25 percent of Mayweather’s asking price while McGregor’s purse is $10 million more than what Mayweather offered. Despite the offer, White made it clear that there are a number of variables that come into play when attempting to make a fight happen between a UFC fighter and a boxer. But he did make one thing clear: Mayweather suggesting that he attempted to make the fight is absolutely false.
“He hasn’t talked to anybody about this fight,” White said. “If you’re talking to anybody about this fight, you are talking to me. I’m the promoter and Conor McGregor is under contract with me.”
White also scoffed at the notion that McGregor hasn’t made more than $8 million in a fight while suggesting that if the fight were to happen, Conor McGregor would get top billing over boxing’s pound-for-pound king.
“How are you the ‘A’ side?” White incredulously asked. “The last major fight that you were in, you left such a bad taste in everybody’s mouth that nobody wants to see you fight again. His last fight did 350,000 pay-per-view buys. Conor’s last two pay-per-views did 1.3 million and 1.5 million buys.”
With so many hoops to jump through in order to make a fight of this magnitude happen, one can simply deem this as posturing by both sides. But if the fight were to be made, there’s no doubt that it would perform well and be one of the most talked about events since Mayweather’s record-breaking bout with Manny Pacquiao in 2015.
“I would be disappointed if a Conor McGregor vs. Floyd Mayweather match didn’t do over 2 million pay-per-view buys,” White said. Mayweather-Pacquiao did an unprecedented 4.6 million pay-per-view buys while smashing a number of records. The fight didn’t live up to the hype as Mayweather cruised to a unanimous decision victory. Mayweather also earned over $200 million for the fight.
With Mayweather stating he’s happily retired and would only fight again if the money were right, there are very few opponents in the boxing world that could command another hefty payday. But a fight with McGregor certainly seems to have his attention.
“The reason you want this Conor McGregor fight so bad is because you know that is your money fight,” White said.
With both sides appearing to be far apart in negotiations, a fight between the two remains unrealistic. Nevertheless, the topic remains in the headlines and will continue to do so as long as they keep talking about it.
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