Mayweather, McGregor ready to rumble.
LAS VEGAS (AP) — Conor McGregor has been kept pretty much under wraps ever since his fight with Floyd Mayweather Jr. was announced, emerging occasionally to trash Mayweather only to disappear again behind the closed doors of the UFC training center.
It's not by accident. The biggest selling point of the spectacle that is Saturday night's 154-pound fight is the unknown.
Is McGregor good enough to land a big punch on Mayweather? Did he acquire enough boxing skills in just a few short months to make what should be a lopsided fight competitive?
Inquiring minds want to know, and there are enough of them to make this the most watched fight in history. Some 50 million people in the U.S. alone are expected to gather with friends and family to see it all unfold.
"I will be the king of both sports," McGregor crowed. "I'm already the king of fighting, I'll soon be the king of boxing."
Not so fast, said Mayweather, who comes from a boxing family and famously began throwing punches before he could walk.
"After 21 years I've been hit with everything and I'm still right here," Mayweather said. "If you give it you must be able to take it."
It's a fight that really makes no sense other than millions of people want to watch it. But the economics of the fight wouldn't make any sense, either, if people saw McGregor — the UFC star who has never boxed professionally — in action and decided he just wasn't good enough to be in the ring with a fighter like Mayweather.
No mystique, no 5 million buys on Showtime pay-per-view. That's why there was never any chance of McGregor having a tuneup fight.
And that is why the only boxing anyone outside McGregor's inner circle has seen was him hitting the heavy bag in a comical media day performance and a few seconds of a UFC clip purportedly showing him knocking down Showtime announcer and former fighter Paulie Malignaggi.
No worries, said McGregor, who says his boxing talents shouldn't be underestimated.
"I've been lacing up the gloves my entire existence," McGregor said. "Of course, we will come with a different approach than people are used to, we will paint many pictures inside the ring. It's not going to end well for Floyd. It's not going to end well for all the people who are doubting me and are so convinced that this is what it is."
McGregor weighed in at 153 pounds Friday to 149 ½ for Mayweather. A crowd that nearly filled the T-Mobile arena — many waving Irish flags — cheered loudly for McGregor while booing Mayweather.
McGregor's fan base is driving this fight, united in their fervent hope that the Irish UFC champion can muscle Mayweather around the ring and deliver knockout punches to his head. Sports books in this gambling city have taken so many