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LAS VEGAS -- Five years have passed and the grudge endures. Miguel Cotto's only response -- keep winning -- resounds with the boxing public.
Impressing Floyd Mayweather has not come so easily.
If you asked around here this weekend, you would find no shortage of people who said Mayweather would dismantle Ricky Hatton in their welterweight title bout late Saturday. Yet many of those same people said the pound-for-pound king needn't search long for his ultimate challenge, because it resides in his own division.
Not once has Mayweather expressed any interest in fighting Cotto. For years, it was assumed his estrangement with his ex-promoter, Bob Arum, who also promotes Cotto, was the reason.
Regardless, the longer he avoids the fight, the more it looks like a dodge.
"He has had great victories, but when you talk about Miguel Cotto and Floyd Mayweather, he always comes up with excuses -- I'm not the opponent for him, I'm not ready for him," Cotto said. "I earned all I have now. I worked for that. Over the next year, year-and-a-half, I can take the big names."
Their personal disagreement dates back years, to an era when Mayweather had grown weary of sitting in the second chair in Arum's Top Rank boxing stable, behind Oscar De La Hoya, and became irked when a new young buck came rutting around his territory.
So Mayweather engaged in some subtle subterfuge.
His appointed workout time at Top Rank Gym immediately preceded Cotto's, so he began showing up a bit late, and staying beyond his time window, to disrupt the young Puerto Rican.
It became such an issue that Top Rank officials had to step in and enforce Mayweather's training schedule.
"He always is acting like that, like he is the owner of everything," Cotto said. "I know it's just
his way to do things. He just tries to you that he is, like I said, the owner of everything."
In the five years since, as Mayweather's star exploded, Cotto's stayed close behind.
Cotto received one of the five nominations this week for 2007 Fighter of the Year, by the Boxing
Writers Association of America. Another nomination is reserved for the Mayweather-Hatton winner.
Two of Cotto's three fights this year also are Fight of the Year nominees, a first for the organization. His 11th-round technical knockout of Zab Judah, in June, came against an opponent Mayweather beat on a decision. His November decision over Shane Mosley exploited a man Mayweather never lured into the ring.
"I had a great year, first beating Oktay Urkal, then Judah and Mosley," Cotto said. "The last two fights were amazing. They put me on another level in boxing. It's an honor that the writers, the people who know boxing, nominated them for Fight of the Year."
The welterweight division is the epicenter of the sport. Mayweather entered Saturday as a 38-0
champion, against a 43-0 challenger in Hatton. Cotto is 31-0. Paul Williams is 33-0. Kermit Cintron is 29-1.
There also are enough old stalking horses and young rising stars (35-5 Antonio Margarito, 36-5 Judah, 20-0 Andre Berto) to sustain the division's upper crust until megafights materialize.
De La Hoya still drives much of what happens at welterweight, even if he hasn't fought in the division since 2001. Arum is working on the assumption that De La Hoya plans to fight the Mayweather-Hatton winner in May. But De La Hoya also could fight Hatton, regardless of Saturday's outcome, because of the massive British audience Hatton attracts, which makes Mayweather-Cotto viable next year.
"At 147 pounds, the welterweight division, to me, it's the hottest division in boxing today," Cotto
said. "Margarito, Mayweather, Hatton, Kermit Cintron, Paul Williams and me. It could be three years of great boxing."
"I just want the big fights, the big names, the real fights. I wish the rest of the opponents want
LAS VEGAS -- Five years have passed and the grudge endures. Miguel Cotto's only response -- keep winning -- resounds with the boxing public.
Impressing Floyd Mayweather has not come so easily.
If you asked around here this weekend, you would find no shortage of people who said Mayweather would dismantle Ricky Hatton in their welterweight title bout late Saturday. Yet many of those same people said the pound-for-pound king needn't search long for his ultimate challenge, because it resides in his own division.
Not once has Mayweather expressed any interest in fighting Cotto. For years, it was assumed his estrangement with his ex-promoter, Bob Arum, who also promotes Cotto, was the reason.
Regardless, the longer he avoids the fight, the more it looks like a dodge.
"He has had great victories, but when you talk about Miguel Cotto and Floyd Mayweather, he always comes up with excuses -- I'm not the opponent for him, I'm not ready for him," Cotto said. "I earned all I have now. I worked for that. Over the next year, year-and-a-half, I can take the big names."
Their personal disagreement dates back years, to an era when Mayweather had grown weary of sitting in the second chair in Arum's Top Rank boxing stable, behind Oscar De La Hoya, and became irked when a new young buck came rutting around his territory.
So Mayweather engaged in some subtle subterfuge.
His appointed workout time at Top Rank Gym immediately preceded Cotto's, so he began showing up a bit late, and staying beyond his time window, to disrupt the young Puerto Rican.
It became such an issue that Top Rank officials had to step in and enforce Mayweather's training schedule.
"He always is acting like that, like he is the owner of everything," Cotto said. "I know it's just
his way to do things. He just tries to you that he is, like I said, the owner of everything."
In the five years since, as Mayweather's star exploded, Cotto's stayed close behind.
Cotto received one of the five nominations this week for 2007 Fighter of the Year, by the Boxing
Writers Association of America. Another nomination is reserved for the Mayweather-Hatton winner.
Two of Cotto's three fights this year also are Fight of the Year nominees, a first for the organization. His 11th-round technical knockout of Zab Judah, in June, came against an opponent Mayweather beat on a decision. His November decision over Shane Mosley exploited a man Mayweather never lured into the ring.
"I had a great year, first beating Oktay Urkal, then Judah and Mosley," Cotto said. "The last two fights were amazing. They put me on another level in boxing. It's an honor that the writers, the people who know boxing, nominated them for Fight of the Year."
The welterweight division is the epicenter of the sport. Mayweather entered Saturday as a 38-0
champion, against a 43-0 challenger in Hatton. Cotto is 31-0. Paul Williams is 33-0. Kermit Cintron is 29-1.
There also are enough old stalking horses and young rising stars (35-5 Antonio Margarito, 36-5 Judah, 20-0 Andre Berto) to sustain the division's upper crust until megafights materialize.
De La Hoya still drives much of what happens at welterweight, even if he hasn't fought in the division since 2001. Arum is working on the assumption that De La Hoya plans to fight the Mayweather-Hatton winner in May. But De La Hoya also could fight Hatton, regardless of Saturday's outcome, because of the massive British audience Hatton attracts, which makes Mayweather-Cotto viable next year.
"At 147 pounds, the welterweight division, to me, it's the hottest division in boxing today," Cotto
said. "Margarito, Mayweather, Hatton, Kermit Cintron, Paul Williams and me. It could be three years of great boxing."
"I just want the big fights, the big names, the real fights. I wish the rest of the opponents want
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