Floyd Mayweather at risk of ruining legacy with farcical exhibition bouts

Floyd Mayweather‘s latest post-retirement bout descended into chaos on Saturday night as his opponent John Gotti III, grandson of infamous mobster John Gotti, sparked a mass brawl in the ring after their fight was waved off in controversial circumstances.

Referee Kenny Bayless called an end to the contest in the sixth round due to excessive holding and trash-talking from the pair.

Angered by the decision, Gotti III vented his frustrations by attacking Mayweather after Bayless had stepped in, as dozens rushed to the ring to intervene. 

These latest farcical scenes follow a series of needless exhibition bouts put on by Mayweather that only serve to damage the legacy of one of the greatest boxers of all time. 

When Mayweather chose to have his 50th and final professional fight against UFC star Conor McGregor back in 2017 there were groans of disapproval from the boxing world.

Floyd Mayweather had his seventh post-retirement fight against John Gotti III on Saturday 

A mass brawl broke out in the ring after Gotti III swung for Mayweather after the fight was stopped

Mayweather vs Logan Paul sold one million PPV’s on Showtime in the United States 

 But it would pale in comparison to what was to come next.

Just 16 months later Mayweather would return to the ring to face kickboxing ace Tenshin Nasukawa in an exhibition bout over in Japan.

The undefeated youngster put up little resistance as he was blasted out in the opening round. 

And for a time that seemed to be the end of it. Yet sadly it wasn’t.

In June 2021, Mayweather’s career hit an all-time low when he squared off against YouTuber Logan Paul in another exhibition farce.

Paul, who outweighed the boxing legend by almost 40lbs, spent the entire eight rounds holding on for dear life as he survived to hear the final bell.

To both men’s credit though, there was at least some level of intrigue surrounding the contest as it pulled in one million pay-per-view buys on Showtime in the United States alone.

However, Mayweather’s proceeding exhibition fights against Don Moore, Mikuru Asakura, Deji Olatunji, Aaron Chalmers and Gotti spectacularly flopped at the box office – at least according to estimates as there have been no official numbers posted for any of the aforementioned bouts.

Mayweather called time on his professional career in 2017 with a win over Conor McGregor

His most recent exhibition bouts haven’t fared so well commercially, especially his penultimate contest with Aaron Chalmers

 Fans appear to have grown tired of Mayweather’s instance of flogging a dead horse and that was clear to see in his penultimate fight with ex-Geordie Shore cast member Aaron Chalmers.

London’s O2 Arena, was nearly completely empty on the night as organisers desperately slashed ticket prices to as low as £5 in an attempt to fill the 20,000 seater.

But that didn’t seem to be a good enough indicator for Mayweather to hang up his gloves for good and so fans were subjected to another tedious showing against Gotti this weekend.