Money is one of the biggest factors surrounding the impending showdown between Floyd Mayweather Jr. and Conor McGregor on Saturday.
One of the sporting world’s modern dream matches came to fruition on the backbone of some good-old trash talk and what is bound to be some of the biggest dollar signs attached to a fight the world has ever seen.
This is a $99.95 pay-per-view, after all, and it features a legend like Mayweather who is literally nicknamed after currency. Kidding aside, it features two legends of their respective sports, so this isn’t a normal fight where one side can soak up the cash and the other has a just-happy-to-be-here moment.
Below, let’s take a look at the known and rumored information about the prize money purse.
Mayweather vs. McGregor Viewing Info
Date: Saturday, Aug. 26
Start Time: 9 p.m. ET (main card)
Watch: pay-per-view ($99.95)
Mayweather-McGregor Fight Card Odds
Floyd Mayweather (-450) vs. Conor McGregor (+325; bet $100 to win $325), super welterweight
Badou Jack (-355) Nathan Cleverly (+290), light heavyweight
Andrew Tabiti (-310) vs. Steve Cunningham (+260), cruiserweight
Gervonta Davis (-3500) Francisco Fonseca (+1300), junior lightweight
If fans thought the money attached to other boxing bout payouts were worth a double take, wait until we dive into some of these numbers.
Should the pay-per-view buys flirt with the same buyrate as the Mayweather-Manny Pacquiao encounter from May 2015, the purse put up between the two men over the weekend will sit in the $390 million range, according to Luke Brown of The Independent.
How the two camps split the cash is one of the bigger non-fight questions surrounding the spectacle. Mayweather is the boxing legend, but McGregor is the dominant mouthpiece who in large part helped this fight become reality.
According to Yahoo Sports writer Kevin Iole, Mayweather has a gigantic guaranteed portion:
It’s hard to imagine McGregor is too far behind in the guaranteed department, especially with Brown going on to suggest total revenue from the fight could flirt with the half-billion mark.
The good news for both fighters is the pot continues to matter less and less given the buy rates of pay-per-views. Both guys are sure to cash in on major endorsement deals, with Mayweather apparently nearing the $25 million mark with some of his sponsorships, according to Gareth A. Davies of the Telegraph.
Even a cushion involved in this fight has resulted in cash, per Davies: “The ring cushion behind Mayweather’s head during the fight, in one of the corners, has been bought out by a betting agent for $3.1 million.”
Both camps know what they are doing, to say the least. It takes one look at either fighter’s social media accounts on the path to this fight to see how else the two have monetized what should be the highest-grossing fight of all time.
Viewers can rather easily get in on the action, too.
As one can see from the odds above, Mayweather is the projected winner by a somewhat significant margin. One would have a hard time finding someone who seriously backs McGregor in a fight like this, either.
That isn’t to suggest the almost universal underdog isn’t confident going into the fight:
But the gap here separating these two in the projections department isn’t hard to figure out. Mayweather sits with a 49-0 record, and though he might have waited long enough to take a slight credibility hit, he has even triumphed against other legends such as Pacquiao.
Though McGregor is talented in his arena and there is an air of mystique around his ability, the UFC juggernaut doesn’t have rounds of meaningful, strict boxing under his belt.
CBSSports.com’s Adam Silverstein summed up the feelings around this fight quite well:
“So this is a boxing match, right? Should I pick the championship-winning ring scientist who is 49-0 and at least has an argument when “greatest of all time” is discussed, or the champion mixed martial artist who has never boxed as an amateur or professional and has only been training for months—not years—for this fight?”
Mayweather is aging now and hasn’t been in the ring for an extended period. The 40-year-old‘s done a good job of mostly acting like the humble veteran walking into a big test, too. But slight possible downgrade in speed or not, the knowledge and skill accrued over a 49-fight undefeated career doesn’t simply go away.
There is always the potential for an upset in a sporting event. Let the projections tell it, though, and this one logically goes to Mayweather.
Odds via OddsShark.
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