Floyd Mayweather Sr, Jeff Mayweather Speak
Kelly Swanson: Thank you everybody for joining us today. Both Mayweather brothers, Floyd Mayweather, Sr. and Jeff Mayweather, who are the respective trainers for Oscar De La Hoya and Steve Forbes are the line with us now. As you all are well aware Oscar De La Hoya and Steve Forbes are fighting this Saturday night at the Home Depot Center 27,000 seat Soccer stadium in Carson, California. It's the first fight ever in the soccer stadium out there. And the fight will be televised live on HBO's World Championship Boxing.
Dan Rafael: Floyd on the call a couple of days ago with Oscar, I asked him about just the idea of how it went for you two guys to get back in the gym together after the one fight hiatus and what it was like, if you were able to just pick it up as business as usual or did you have to kind of rehash and discuss what had gone on for the past several months? Can you just describe what it was like going back to work with Oscar after all of the, really crazy stuff that had gone on prior to the fight with your son?
Floyd Mayweather, Sr.: The whole thing was that we had unfinished business, the one thing they offered me I wasn't going for it. That was one thing, but we straightened all of that out and we never really had any real problem. We didn't have a real problem, we merely squashed things. They picked Roach. It wasn't Roach's turn so what difference did it make to Roach? It didn't make any difference to him. So, Roach took the job, which I would have done too. It was just that he did his thing with Roach, and it didn't work and won't ever work, so he came back with the best.
Dan Rafael: Jeff, you're the Mayweather that doesn't get a whole lot of attention these days. Your nephew gets a lot of attention, obviously, and Roger and Floyd, Sr. get quite a bit of attention. Can you first of all describe your relationship with each of your brothers, Roger and Floyd, Sr. and also your relationship with your nephew?
Jeff Mayweather: Actually I have a pretty good relationship with Roger and my brother Floyd.
Floyd Mayweather, Sr.: Hey let me say he's got a good relationship with us. He said, "I got a pretty good relationship." He has got a good relationship with us.
Jeff Mayweather: Yes I have a good relationship with both of my brothers, but my nephew – It's one of those situations where at some point in time either him or myself, will have to make a decision on being the bigger person and squashing all that happened in the past and just let it be and let it go. But actually, I have no problem with him either. And it's just a situation that happened a long time ago when there was the rival with James Prince at that point in time. It was me and Floyd, my older brother, and we both were working with his son and all of the sudden he just – I was doing all of the things that a manager does, getting all of the contacts and doing all of the things that needed to be done, with Top Rank and everything. And for some reason he got a manager, and I never even knew this guy. It just came out of nowhere.
And it was kind of like, to me, a slap in the face and I felt like there was no need for me to be there. I was basically doing the things that a manager does, even though I wasn't making the manager's fee. But I love him doing these things, and plus I want to see the best for you. Once he brought in James Prince there was no need for me to be there. And I'm one of those people that, once I know that I'm not needed or not wanted I'm not going to stay around and belittle myself and try to hang around to try to get a handout or whatever the case may be. And I already knew my nephew, I know him and know that that he's never going to be man enough to come out and say that he didn't want me there, but his actions showed that he didn't want me there, so I left.
Franklin McNeil: My first question is for Floyd. A lot of people are saying that Stevie is a preliminary fight for Oscar in preparation for a potential September fight with Oscar. My question to you is are there any similarities, and you've known Stevie a long time, are there any similarities style wise between Stevie and Floyd Jr.?
Floyd Mayweather, Sr.: Well let me say this to you first, I've trained Stevie for nine fights, so I know about Stevie. And I'll be honest with you I'm not going to say that he's a fighter like Floyd is, but he can give the look. He can roll his shoulders and come back with his right hand, I worked with him on that a lot and as a matter of fact, Stevie had worked with all three brothers. Stevie had worked with Jeff, Roger and myself. So, he had a taste of us all. But my thing is is that, of course my brother thinks his fighter is going to win, I think my fighter is going to win and we'd be evil minded if we thought any different. But I feel like my man is bigger, stronger, punches harder, I think he's faster and those are the edges I would give my fighter.
Franklin McNeil: Okay. And on that note I have a question for you Jeff. Just like your brother you've known Stevie a long time, you've worked with Stevie. Over the years have you seen Stevie, now that you're working with him for this fight, how has he improved as a fighter?
Jeff Mayweather: Well I think that it is one of the things that Stevie has been taught by all of us, so I mean he will be the closest fighter out there to emulate Floyd Junior. And so I think that's one of the reasons why this fight is happening. But I've seen improvements in Steve even from the short time I've been with him now, His maturity as a fighter outside the ring, and inside the ring as well have grown, but the one thing that I see is Steve that he has fast hands and is an extremely strong body puncher. And I guess a lot of guys that aren't really punchers can punch extremely strong to the body and that's one of the attributes that I've seen since I've came aboard for this fight in particular. And I can see his right hand is a lot stronger now. And so I mean we're basically going to fight a smart fight. It's like we're climbing a very, very steep hill and and not just because it's De La Hoya, but because of the business of the boxing game as well. This has already happened where De La Hoya had a big fight already in place, contracts already signed, and actually in my honest opinion he lost the fight, but the fight still happened. So we're not just facing Oscar. We're facing the business of boxing as well. And I wouldn't be honest if I didn't say that. So my objective going into this fight is, of course, to win, but not only just win it, we also have to look good, look good enough, that the boxing public, the boxing media, are going to give us our just dues as well at the end of the day. If we win the fight, if we don't get it in the ring, hopefully we'll get it through the writers, through the public, through the media, or whoever. Not only that, me and Steve will sit down and we've also talked about the importance of this fight and he still has to look good enough that the public will want to see him again. And Steve is actually not 150 pounds. Steve can go down to 140. There's fights like Ricky Hatton, there's fights like Malignaggi, there's other opportunities out there as well. But, looking at the business side of boxing we have a very, very steep hill to climb and I'm not going to sugarcoat anything. I know what the situation is. Basically, I hope that Steve performs to a level that he can and actually wins this fight in the ring. I hope that the powers and the judges will make the right decision.
Kevin Iole: Jeff I wanted to ask you, first of all, have you ever been in a fight where Floyd or Roger was in the other corner and if so who was that?
Jeff Mayweather: No. To be honest I think that this is probably a first in boxing that I know of. I mean especially when you're talking about a boxing match on this level. And I think that this is probably a part of history, me matching wits against my brother.
Kevin Iole: And I wonder, which of your two brothers do you think your training style is closest to, Big Floyd or Roger?
Jeff Mayweather: I think I'm more close to Big Floyd because we both were pretty much boxers in our own career and he stresses defense and I stress defense and Roger was more of a puncher, and that's what Roger stresses. Roger stresses more aggression and less boxing.
Kevin Iole: Big Floyd, given the fact that you know Stevie so well and you trained him for so many fights, do you think that it gives an you advantage? Or does it give his side an advantage?
Floyd Mayweather, Sr.:I think to some degree that we trained with Stevie and my brother trained with him and all, and of course I think it gives him some type of edge. We arent planning on giving him the edge that he wants, but I'm pretty sure it will give him some kind of edge. So I hope it isnt the edge that he's looking for. Stevie is a good fighter and I trained him. I don't know if he fought the last fight that I trained him I don't know if he did or not.
Kevin Iole: And finally Floyd, if I can ask you this, have you ever worked with Roger in the other corner where you had a fighter and Roger was in the other corner?
Floyd Mayweather, Sr.: No – amateur, no; professional, no. With neither one of my brothers I never was across the corner from either one of them. It's just one of those things that happen. You've got three brothers in the game and my son's in the game, you know. You thought something like this could happen? It's just that way because you've got brothers training a lot of fighters and you've got fighters at the same weight that it could happen. I think that it could've happened. It's going to happen, as a matter of fact. It's going to happen Saturday and in September, I guess it's going to happen again.
David Avila,Riverside Press: Floyd why is it that Oscar had not so much stamina when he fought against Little Floyd in his last fight?
Floyd Mayweather, Sr.: Now I'm going to tell you this right here, I wasn't the trainer. Freddie Roach was the trainer. And it's not only that because sometimes, they have this thing called strength training, strength coaching. I've never heard anything like that in my life. The strength trainer thing – I think it's bad for boxing to be honest. I think that because there's so many gimmicks and gadgets they have. They want you to be jumping over balloons and taking balls on ropes and banging it up against the wall and then taking balls up and throw them up against the walls and they want you to be jumping over little objects and stuff, you could break your chin or your legs. They have so much stuff that it's unbelievable. Don't get me wrong it's just bad they can call all them trainers. One of those guys, I'm going to tell you about him. They need to get out of the game and find something else to do because of all of this stuff they have. Oscar gets tired, one reason, because of the strength training. They've got you doing too much stuff that doesn't even go with boxing. And like I said they need to get out of the game. That's my opinion. As far as Oscar goes, Oscar's been getting tired for years, before I even trained with him. Oscar just needs to relax a little bit. As a matter of fact the last fight that I had with Oscar, he did what he was supposed to do and he relaxed and did what I told him to do. He blew Mayorga out. That's what he needed to do, he needs to just to relax his mind. A lot of this stuff is happening because you're thinking about it in your head. "I'm going to get tired if I go so many rounds and I'm going to..." a lot of times that does happen. I don't know if that's the case with him or not, but like I said I'm doing my best to keep him as relaxed as possible, and if I have him relaxed I'm pretty sure he'll get the job done. I have some other plans about that but as of right now I think that's the whole problem. I don't think it's anything except for the fact that is it in his mind. It's not that he isn't in good condition because Oscar is a very hard trainer and he works hard. It's his mind; that's all it could be is his mind. If he lets his mind relax you're sure going to see something special.
Ramon Aranda: Floyd talk to us a little bit about the De La Hoya/Mayweather fight were Roach was Oscar's trainer. Had you trained Oscar in that first fight, what do you think you would have done differently to help Oscar's chance of winning in that fight?
Floyd Mayweather, Sr.: Well see, there's different people, there's different trainers. That first fight you had Freddie the Joke Coach Roach and you had him doing his thing and now you've got not only the greatest trainer of this time, that time, four time, five times, but now you've got him of all time. Now I'm going to tell you what I would have had him - well, I'm going to be honest with you and not to be disrespectful, I'm not going to give out my knowledge like that. I'm not going to give it out because people might be listening and when this stuff comes up they're going to be looking for it. I don't ever want anybody to see what I'm doing.
Ramon Aranda: Very true. Jeff had mentioned in the Countdown that it was very important for him that the whole family had gotten together, especially for your mom. Now thoughts on that, have you guys had any talks with Roger?
Floyd Mayweather, Sr.: Well I'm going to be honest, me and Jeff we never had a problem with talking and Jeff never had a problem talking with my brother Roger, and I really don't have a problem talking with Roger. When Roger came over to my house it was before I went to Puerto Rico. It was pretty close to me going at that time, but Roger and his brother in-law came over to my house and we laughed and we had a good time. Everybody wants to make it look like were a violent family that can't function. Nobody can mingle if your mind isn't right. Even when I train I tell them if your mind isn't right, you're not going to be right. I'm just saying that we are not dysfunctional family. Anybody could have a difference in their family. Dysfunctional families are people that go in there and kill their mama, kill their daddy, kill the whole family, and then maybe want to go over there and cut up the cousins. That's what a dysfunctional family is. It's sick. Just because somebody has a difference in a family, that's not dysfunctional. If that's the case the world is dysfunctional because everybody's got differences in their family. No two people think alike, and I'm pretty sure you've got dysfunctional people in your family too.
Floyd Mayweather, Sr.: Everybody has that. That doesn't mean you're family is dysfunctional because people don't agree on everything. There are two people that don't get along, that's not dysfunctional. Dysfunction is when you go in there and do something stupid, go in there with the hot grease, throw the hot grease in their daddy's face, and then break his ribs or something. That's dysfunctional. But I'll say that it's not the case with the Mayweather family. The Mayweather family is a warm family and it ain't bad as it's perceived to be. I'm going to tell you what this dysfunctional thing is, I'm going to tell you where the dysfunctional loop is – That's Floyd Mayweather Jr. That's where the dysfunctional comes in.
Kelly Swanson: Again the fight is this Saturday night at the Home Depot Center Soccer Stadium, 27,000 seats and also live on HBO's World Championship Boxing
