Floyd Mayweather will earn more than $300 million dollars for his final contest against Conor McGregor revealing just minutes after his historic 50th victory that he had been unable to spar for the final month of training camp because of lingering damage to his hands.
The unbeaten 40-year-old also disclosed that a $400,000 dollar bet on himself to win by knockout in under nine and a half rounds had been refused by bookmakers on The Strip just hours before the Sin City fight heard its first bell.
“For the last month I didn’t do no sparring,” Mayweather said. “I wanted my hands to be 100 percent for the fight. I wanted my hands to be solid. My hands are real brittle, you know that.”
“I wanted my hands to be solid so when I came out here and I’m shooting hard shots, I was able to put the guy down,” he explained, admitting that he was “shocked” by McGregor’s ability to switch from mixed martial arts to boxing.
“That was the plan. Let him come out trying to kill me with big shots early on, and then beat him down the stretch. My father thought it would be six or seven. It took a little longer.
While Mayweather will earn around 50 per cent of overall takings from the fight, McGregor’s purse was guaranteed at $30m (£23.3m), which will rise to around $75m once royalties and pay per view numbers are in.
