Jeff Haney's boxing column appears Thursday. Reach him at (702) 259-4041 or [email protected].
Much like the eponymous outlaw-with-a-heart-of-gold immortalized in song by Woody Guthrie, "Pretty Boy" Floyd Mayweather believes he's unfairly being portrayed as a "bad guy."
Mayweather's latest vilification has come in the buildup to Saturday's showdown against rough-and-tumble Arturo Gatti, the apparent people's choice in their WBC super lightweight championship bout in Atlantic City.
Perhaps it's because Mayweather plays the role of "heel" so well, sneering that Gatti's nothing more than a "club fighter," a "paper champion," a "bum."
Or because of the intermittent trouble with the law Mayweather has experienced throughout his career.
Or because Gatti himself stoked the flames by pointing out that Floyd, his father, Floyd Sr., and his uncle and trainer, Roger Mayweather, all have "big mouths."
"What is the part they don't know? I'm a family man," Mayweather, of Las Vegas by way of Grand Rapids, Mich., protested on a recent conference call. "I have a strong belief and I am really blessed from God. So that's why I feel that I'm humble. ....
"We have a big fight coming up and we give away free turkeys and are always giving something back to the community. ... (The media are) going to write what they want to write. But they need a bad guy and I understand. When Bernard Hopkins fought (Felix) Trinidad, Hopkins was the bad guy. When Oscar De La Hoya fought Trinidad, then Trinidad was the bad guy. So that's how it works, you have to have a bad guy and a good guy. ...
"At the end of the day, if my kids are happy, I'm happy, no matter what the media says about me."
Saturday's scheduled 12-rounder for supremacy at 140 pounds (HBO Pay-Per-View, $44.95 suggested retail price, 6 p.m. PDT) could be a pivotal fight in the careers of both men.
Though he has won plenty of style points in compiling a pro record of 33-0 with 22 knockouts, Mayweather, 28, has yet to establish himself as a top-level pay-per-view star.
This fight could change that perception, said promoter Bob Arum of Top Rank, who expects the card to generate about 500,000 pay-per-view buys.
"That will mark Floyd as a pay-per-view commodity so we won't have any difficulty in his next pay-per-view fight convincing the pay-per-view companies and satellite providers to run a hell of a lot of spots to publicize the fight," Arum said.
For 33-year-old Gatti (39-6, 30 KOs), a victory would put an exclamation point on his transition from a fearless but straightforward brawler to a skilled, multidimensional boxer.
To that end, trainer Buddy McGirt said he expects Gatti to stay busy throughout the fight, countering Mayweather's quickness by hammering him with blows to the biceps, the shoulders, the ears -- "everywhere but the bottom of his feet."
"Most guys when they fight Floyd sit in front of him, try to match him speed-for-speed," McGirt said. "Or (they) try to hit him in the chin. You're never gonna hit him in the chin, so why worry about (his) chin? You ain't gonna hit Floyd on the chin. It's like trying to catch a mosquito with a net. It ain't gonna happen."
Mayweather, regarded by some as the sport's top fighter, pound-for-pound, said he'll bring a basic plan of attack to the ring.
"I am going to box him, then I am going to destroy him," Mayweather said.
Enhancing his "bad guy" image, Mayweather took a verbal shot at McGirt.
"Let's talk about McGirt's chin," Mayweather said. "This is the guy who was knocked out (in 1988) by Meldrick Taylor, who was not a big puncher at all. ...
"(Gatti is) going to find out that I can crack once I hit him on his chin. You can ask anybody out there who's chin I have cracked."
The contentious nature of the matchup even spilled over into negotiations regarding where the fight would be held. Although Mayweather has said Las Vegas and Madison Square Garden were legitimate contenders to host the fight, Gatti's representatives took issue with that statement: They said New York would not have approved the bout because of a legal problem Mayweather faced at the time involving a misdemeanor battery charge in Grand Rapids.
The pro-Gatti crowd at Boardwalk Hall won't influence the fight anyway, Mayweather said.
"He's going to come out and (fans) from Atlantic City are going to be cheering and going crazy," Mayweather, a 4-1 betting favorite, said. "Then after the first few punches I land, everybody is going to sit down and be quiet."
LV showing
A closed-circuit showing of Gatti-Mayweather will be available at Caesars Palace. Tickets are $50, and doors open at 5 p.m. Saturday at Caesars' events center, located behind the Garden of the Gods pools and gardens.
Orleans card
A Guilty Boxing card Friday at the Orleans features two Eastern European heavyweights who are cousins: Sultan Ibragimov and Timur Ibragimov.
Sultan Ibragimov (16-0, 14 KOs), ranked No. 7 by the WBO, faces Jimmy Joseph (15-3-1, 14 KOs) of Trinidad in a fight scheduled for 12 rounds. Timur Ibragimov (18-0-1, 10 KOs), ranked No. 18 by the WBC, meets Rogerio Lobo (34-12, 29 KOs) of Brazil in a 10-rounder.
Six-round bouts on the undercard include: light heavyweight Makhmud Otazhanov (4-2, 3 KOs) of the Ukraine and Orwell, Ohio, against Gabriel Cruz (5-0, 1 KO) of Fresno, Calif.; super middleweight Clayton Conceicao (5-0, 4 KOs) of Sao Paulo against Leroy Brooks (12-5, 6 KOs) of Las Vegas; super lightweight Merhav Mohar (15-1, 10 KOs) of Israel and Brooklyn, N.Y., against Juan Carlos Escobar (12-10-2, 6 KOs) of Culiacan, Mexico; and super flyweight Juan Mercedes (6-1, 4 KOs) of San Juan, P.R., against Jose Albuquerque (4-1, 2 KOs) of Glendale, Calif.
Four-rounders on the undercard include: cruiserweight Aaron Williams (1-0, 1 KO) of Las Vegas against Cesar Carbajal (3-5, 2 KOs) of Prescott, Ariz.; and super featherweight Vincent O'Neil (0-0-1) of Las Vegas against Rudy Cruz Jr. (1-1, 0 KOs) of Fresno, Calif.
Doors open at the Mardis Gras Ballroom at 6:30 p.m., and the show starts at 7. Tickets are $25 and $35.
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