Anik: Floyd Mayweather needs Conor McGregor and the UFC a lot more than they need him

Talk about the proposed boxing match between Floyd Mayweather and Conor McGregor was reignited recently, with Dana White even offering both fighters $25 million plus pay-per-view points. It’s an offer that Floyd and other pundits laughed at, but a couple of UFC figures are saying that it isn’t as crazy as it sounds.

“I feel like everybody focused on Dana White saying $25 million,” UFC commentator Jon Anik said on the It’s Time podcast. “But they really should’ve focused on what else he said, which is the fact that the biggest fight Floyd Mayweather has right now, is Conor McGregor. That’s the fight he needs. There’s really no other fight for Floyd Mayweather right now that going to command 2, if not 3 million pay-per-view buys. So tell me who needs who?

“Certainly Conor could realize the biggest payday of his career, but he can fight Nate Diaz and all these other guys, and make 25, 30, if not 40 million. Floyd needs Conor and the UFC a lot more than they need him right now.”

Anik also stated that while he has it doubts of it ever pushing through, it would be a bout that would sell really well.

“I don’t think it’s going to happen, but I went from somebody who was totally off board, to being pretty firmly on board,” Anik said. “I think it goes north of 3 million (pay-per-view buys). How far north? I don’t know. I would argue, even if marketed poorly, it’s doing 2.5 million. And you know it’s not going to be marketed poorly.”

According to Bruce Buffer, it’s with this amount of pay-per-view buys that makes it a sensible offer to Mayweather.

“When I hear everyone balk at this offer, and I read social media — it’s 25 million guaranteed, not counting the revenue from pay-per-view,” Buffer said. “The pay-per-view alone is going to double or triple that 25 million, and nobody has any complaints.”

While Anik has a point that this would be the biggest fight possible for Mayweather today, there’s a few problems with Buffer’s argument about nobody having complaints after the pay-per-view money comes in.

For one thing, Mayweather has had a far bigger guarantee on all of his bouts this decade. Also, we still don’t know the percentage the UFC is willing to give Floyd when it comes to pay-per-views, so we don’t know if that’s actually going to “triple” the guaranteed purse. What we do know, is that it is safe to assume that the share the UFC gives him won’t even come close to his normal cut from his other fights.

Another important thing to note is that Floyd also doesn’t just get revenue from PPV, as there’s also ticket sales, merch, local and international TV rights, concessionaires, sponsorships, and other sources. The UFC normally gets to keep those for themselves, but will they now concede those to Mayweather as well?

While it’s true that this may be Floyd’s biggest — and possibly easiest — potential bout out there, there’s really a lot of things to negotiate and a far higher offer that needs to be made... Well, that’s if they ever legitimately try to make this happen.