By Chris LaBate
Floyd Mayweather Jr. appeared before the press for the first leg of his promotional tour for the welterweight clash with WBC champion Victor Ortiz, which is set for September 17 at the MGM Grand in Las Vegas. When Mayweather stepped to the mic to address the press, he openly discussed the issues behind a potential fight with Manny Pacquiao and how both of them need to take random Olympic drug tests in order to make their fight happen. And he also spoke about his issues with former promoter Bob Arum, the CEO of Top Rank.
"I want to let the fans know, Floyd Mayweather don't duck of dodge anyone. And this is for the fans and the Pacquiao fans too. Do I want the Pacquiao fight? Absolutley. If that's what the fans want, that's what I'll give them, but I can't overlook Victor Ortiz. He's tough and he's earned the right. Out of 29 fights, he's had 22 knockouts. I don't want to hear that he lost before, because right now he's world champion," Mayweather said.
"I just want to touch on this because everybody wants to know the situation. And it's not just Pacquiao, it's sports period. If you go look at sports in the Olympics, they're cheating. Everyone is cheating. And I never once said Manny Pacquiao was cheating. I just said that me and any opponent that I face, must take the test. Not only in the sport of boxing, there is just cheating in sports period. HBO could have already made the fight happen by stepping and saying 'both of you take the test' and this fight would have happened."
"I never discredited Manny Pacquiao. He was in the sport before me. When I came into the sport of boxing in 96, they said this kid is going to be a superstar. You never just see a kid in the middle of his career become a star. Now I'm not taking anything away from him. When I was with Bob Arum, I was the greatest thing that ever lived. All of a sudden, I learned the sport of boxing and went on my own and made my own company and didn't want to deal with a middleman, and then all of a sudden it's like 'he's ducking all of these fighters.' But all of these fighters that they say I'm ducking happen to be Bob Arum fighters. Sometimes they seem to forget about Bob Arum doing bribery. I just want everyone to open their minds."
