Comments Thread For: Floyd Mayweather Jr. and the End of The U.S. Era

[-Kev-]

"As Mayweather exits, the age of genuine globalization in boxing is fully upon us."

Mayweather built a successful brand, he earned the most he could and the social media & internet era was no doubt a huge intangible player.

We still have Andre Ward for a potential USA #1 P4P after that it doesn't look too good.

Terrence Crawford is 27 now, in 3 years he will be #1 P4P, top 3 very soon, Ward would be in the tail end of his career(34), with probably a couple of more years left. There's also Keith Thurman who is 26 now, he has potential. Porter is young enough to bounce back from his Brook loss but I don't think he will ever be #1. Broner is a lost cause. He should be fighting at 140 permanenty, he should not fight any WW.

[////]

Never been anything superior about American boxers ? Most of the greatest boxers were mostly American ..Please enlighten us as to who from EE and even Latin America were as great as SRR,Muhammed Ali and SRL ?

it's pretty obvious most of the historical greats' records would have looked DRAMATICALLY different if the sport was as equally distributed as it is now

Same with modern fighters, quillin vs jacobs would probably seem like some epic middleweight matchup if you traded out pirog and lee with some golden age railroad workers. Now it just seems mediocre. Amazing what being sheltered can do for the ego.

Ali would have a bunch of red boxes labelled Sergey Schenkov and Wldymamrzk Dastuk and there would go his legendaryness

"These are the facts!"

[Scipio2009]

US boxing has been flatlining for a while. Mayweather has been smoke and mirrors, he wasn't a guy who fought who we wanted when we asked for the bouts, there was a lot of manipulation there.

Beyond that, I think Pacquiao is still a bigger draw than Canelo in the US. Canelo fought on regular HBO last time out and I expect Pacquiao to be back on PPV against Crawford soon enough.

US boxing is simply different now; with the fracturing of all media, things have reverted to more regional stars; Terrence Crawford in Omaha, Andre Ward in Oakland, Danny Garcia in New York, Adrien Broner in Cincinnatti, Wilder in Birmingham, Fonfara/Szpilka in Chicago, etc (no different than how the boxing scene has been in the UK with Eddie Hearn) are all strong draws in their home markets, with national exposure varying by how the TV pushes things.

note: it's funny to see you trash Floyd Mayweather for being "smoke and mirrors", yet offer no such critique for Manny Pacquiao [Clottey, Margarito, Mosley (after Floyd skunked him), Brandon Rios(off of a loss), Algieri is some murderer's row, lol]

[Scipio2009]

Cliff poses a really good question. Grantland had an article suggesting Floyd is the last of the Great American prizefighters. I think they both make a good point.

I think Crawford and Spence have potential to be the best down the road. LSC could climb if he fought who he should. Other than that, I look at Canelo, Loma, Verdejo, Gonzalez, Valdez, Kovalev, Joshua, Bieterbiev, Walters and some others as the future top of the sport. Also Cruiserweight is emerging as the best division in the sport and there are no top US fighters there.

I hope Floyd shifts from promoting to working with the US amateur program where his style would have a TREMENDOUS impact if he focused on reviving amateur boxing in the US.

Even Floyd Mayweather isn't a big enough force to force change by AIBA; financing the American amateur system (gutting the host of political nonsense that has stubbed the program in the foot) won't do anything to change the rules governing the Olympic level of amateur boxing. You simply watch the 2012 Olympic boxing event and you'd see that such an effort would be futile (Errol Spence was flashing some of the ability that he's shown as a professional, but the AIBA rules ran completely counter to the things that he has had success with).

You add that AIBA took off the headgear for it's top amateur level (when even pro fighters don't spar without headgear) and... eh

[Scipio2009]

I have been thoroughly unimpressed with the last couple US Olympic teams and in the past, that has been the breeding ground for almost all American boxing superstars that emerged throughout history.

Andre Ward was the last special fighter I have seen come out of the U.S. amateur system.

Erroll Spence and Erickson Lubin(didn't want to wait for the 2016 team) seem to be pretty special fighters to me; time will tell, though.

[Scipio2009]

The country obviously made a difference otherwise Pacquiao-Bradley wouldn't have registered at 800k in comparison to the Algieri and Rios fights @ around 400k.

... or maybe the paying public viewed Pacquiao-Bradley as being twice the fight as Pacquiao fighting a dude coming off of a loss (Rios) and Pacquiao fighting a guy in only his 2nd/3rd (depending on how you rate Emmanuel Taylor) fight. lol

[Scipio2009]

Terrence Crawford is 27 now, in 3 years he will be #1 P4P, top 3 very soon, Ward would be in the tail end of his career(34), with probably a couple of more years left. There's also Keith Thurman who is 26 now, he has potential. Porter is young enough to bounce back from his Brook loss but I don't think he will ever be #1. Broner is a lost cause. He should be fighting at 140 permanenty, he should not fight any WW.

How is 34 the tail end of a career for Andre Ward? Ward only turned 31 years of age, has only been a professional for a decade (with easily two of those years where he wasn't taking any physical punishment), only had 120 amateur fights, and seems to live a clean life.

You add that Ward's style, though well equipped to take advantage of his current physical gifts, is built to age extremely well, basically allowing for him to compete for however long he wants.

Have no doubt that Ward likely has another 6-8 prime years to work through, before starting a 10-year decline (slippage starts to set in, but Ward's veteran craft and trips/traps that he's picked up will keep him competitive against all but the p4p fighters at 175/200); doubt that Ward is ever 45 years old, still taking punches, but simply speaking on ability at that point.

[Zaroku]

Dubai & Macao,
No tax in Dubai & I believe low tax in Macao.
If an American citizen fights abroad, he will still have to pay federal tax. Manny didn't have to pay US taxes if he fought in Macao.

I work in Tokyo but have to pay both Japanese & some US tax too.

[Mr. Philadel]

We still got Ward, Crawford, Thurman and puppies like Spence and J-Rock on the come up....boxing is American, Mexican, Rican and British...the Eastern Euros are making noise but the only dude who's REALLY putting his stamp on the game besides Wlad is Krusher...the others have **** to prove

[Mikhnienko]

2008 US Olympic team has already produced 3 champions: Wilder, Andrade, and Russell Jr. And that was supposed to be a bad team. Has any other country even produced 2 champs from their 2008 team?

Ukraine had Lomachenko, Usyk and Derevyanchenko but none of them turned pro until 2013. Vasyl already has one and schooled Russell, Usyk will within a year and Sergei is probably the best prospect at 160 but i don't see him getting one if Golovkin acquires them all and stays there.