COLUMN: McGregor vs. Mayweather

     Let’s just say we were a little nervous going into the McGregor vs. Mayweather fight last Saturday night. Some friends of ours purchased the fight and invited us over, along with others.

     About an hour or so before the main attraction, we discovered the servers for the fight had crashed in Florida and California. It looked like we may not get to see the fight after all.

     Someone in our group was following the news on Twitter. We were not in a panicky state yet. Surely this would be fixed. And sure enough, just like that the undercard fights appeared and we were on our way to seeing history.

     Connor McGregor, the underdog from Ireland, hoped to make the crossover from MMA into the boxing ring. The fact that he picked perhaps the best pound-for-pound fighter in the world to mess with, Floyd Mayweather, set up a big payday for both.

     In case you didn’t know, Mayweather has never been beaten in the ring and had been retired. But big dollars and the chance to take on one of MMA’s best was too good to turn down.

     Once we knew the television glitches were taken care of, a pool was started and we settled in for the main event.

     The fight started off methodical. McGregor went out and looked to have won the first three rounds, only because he was the aggressor.

     Rounds four thru six seemed to be about even but I got the sense that was about to change. Mayweather seemed to start slow but after the fight, he acknowledged that was their fight plan.

     As Mayweather picked up the pace, you could see McGregor starting to tire at the ends of each round, seven through nine. He would start out strong but his legs were starting to go.

     In the tenth, McGregor was gassed and Mayweather pounced on that open door. It was only a matter of minutes until the referee, Robert Byrd, stopped the fight. You could see McGregor was gassed but not hurt. Many will question the decision of Byrd to call it when he did. Byrd probably made the right decision.

     It was fun to see a much-hyped fight actually live up to its billing. Mayweather announced his decision to retire again after this fight. But could the thought of another $300 million paycheck change that? That would most likely happen if McGregor vs. Mayweather 2 takes place.