Mayweather Sr. Slams Critics Who Are Ripping Berto PPV

By Edward Chaykovsky

Floyd Mayweather Sr., father and trainer for WBC/WBA welterweight champion Floyd Mayweather Jr., is often taking shots at rivals fighters and their trainers - but the former fighter has come out in defense of his son's upcoming opponent, former two-time champion Andre Berto.

Mayweather Jr. will defend his belts against Berto on September 12th at the MGM Grand in Las Vegas. The five division world champion is promising that his Showtime Pay-Per-View bout will be his final fight as a pro.

Critics and a high volume of fans are not pleased with the match. Many were anticipating the possibility of Mayweather facing Amir Khan, Keith Thurman or even IBF champion Kell Brook.

Selecting Berto, who went 3-3 in his last six fights, was totally unexpected. Some of the oddsmakers have Mayweather listed as an 80-1 favorite and a few sites have him as high as 100-1. Others sites are a little more reasonable by listing Mayweather at around 34-1. 

Mayweather Sr. says the critics who are bashing the fight are only providing meaningless opinions.

"Well, it don’t make no difference about what the people think or feel because none of those people are in the ring. Nobody has to worry about that," Mayweather Sr. told On The Ropes Boxing Radio .

"Any man is a threat. I’m just saying that any man can get lucky, anything can happen in a fight, anything. I’m not gonna sit up and say that he doesn’t have the quality to fight Floyd because things happen. The man has power, sometimes when a man throws power, sometimes a man gets lucky."

"Anything can happen in a fight, anything can happen. That’s when you least expect things to happen, in fights. As far as technically, I think little Floyd is the best fighter, not for Berto, I think Floyd technically is the best fighter in the world right now."