"It's going to be very hard for Floyd to stay retired. As you see, he's still getting the bright lights now, but it's nothing like competing. It's nothing like getting on the stage for a weigh-in and showing people you are back. It's nothing like walking up in a ring and it's a one-on-one fight and it's like, "I'm here!" It's nothing like that. That's the biggest excitement you're ever going to get," stated Hall of Fame two-division former world champion Mark "Too Sharp" Johnson, who shared his thoughts on what it will be like for former pound-for-pound king Floyd Mayweather during his retirement. According to Johnson, it's very difficult to resist the urge to fight on. Check out what else he had to say on Floyd Mayweather's retirement.
MARK "TOO SHARP" JOHNSON ON FLOYD MAYWEATHER'S RETIREMENT:
One thing about boxing, one thing you always want to hear, this is always a great thing and I have always said this, "And new..." or "And still..." There is nothing that can replace that. And then as a fighter, when the National Anthem comes on and they get to the part where they say, "And the home of the brave," and the crowd starts to clapping, it's like, "Oh yeah, we about to do this!" I think Floyd has a lot of stuff going for himself from a promotional aspect and management. He got a lot of good guys around him. I hope he does the right thing and I think he will. We need a guy like Floyd in that position where he is in a power struggle and he's in the streets. Now you can't say nothing about that man. I ask people this one question about Floyd, I say, let me ask you one question, "Would you put Floyd in your top 15 to 20 of all time?" The guy said, "No!" So I said, "Would you put Ray Leonard in your top 20 of all time?" He say, "Yeah!" I said, "Well, Ray Leonard ducked Aaron Pryor and you're not going to hold that against him?" He told me he wasn't going to hold that against him and I said, "Okay, that's fine." But the difference from Ray Leonard and Floyd is back then, you had to fight the best to be the best. You knew you was going to get a good fight when they signed. Ray Leonard/Marvin Hagler, you knew you were going to get a good fight when Ray Leonard said, "I want a 20 x 20 ring." That was unheard of and Marvin Hagler said, "So what, get it." Ray Leonard said, "I want to fight in 10 ounce gloves," and Marvin Hagler said, "Get em'!" That's what guys did around that time. Ray Leonard wanted 12 rounds and Marvin Hagler wanted 15 rounds; they fought 12 rounds.
I tell people this all the time. A lot of people say, "Well, you know Floyd wanted Olympic-style testing and this and that." I said, "Let me explain one thing to y'all. Great athletes and great coaches can change the game for whatever it is." You look at, I think it was either St. John's or John Thompson, but they would pass the ball around 100 times and then they came out with the shot clock. Then you had Ali and those guys saying 15 rounds was too long to be fighting. What did they do? They dropped it down to 12. Those changes were looked at as good changes and changes geared towards the betterment of the sport. Well, what the hell is Olympic-style testing? Then they said, Ray Leonard had all of his eye troubles because he got thumbed in the eye. What they come up with? Thumbless gloves. Now, Floyd said he want Olympic-style testing. Guess what! Now everybody is going for the Olympic-style testing. Great athletes and great people can change the game in whatever game it is. A lot of people just look at it as a reason they don't like Floyd or they disagree with what he does and this and that. No! I look at it like this, you take a guy like me, who like I said, never made over $120,000 and I go hit the number for $7 million, what am I gonna do? I'm going to do something right away where this $7 million can become $200 million because I know what I need to do. Floyd knew what he needed to do. He has Warren Buffet around him, he has Al Haymon, who is a great great business man, and he got more money then he can count now. I don't even know if his accountant could count it. But there is going to come a time where Floyd is going to have to put himself in a position to make sure that the money keeps rolling, and as far as what I see him doing, he's doing a great job. And he's done a great job!
But it's hard to stay retired, man. Every now and again, I will see a fight and I'll get up and start shadow boxing and my momma and pops be like, "Boy, sit down!" (Laughing) I say, "I'm going in the gym tomorrow!" "Boy sit down!" I saw [Fernando] Montiel fight the other night and I hit him with a, "Man, sit down." So now as I work with my kids in the gym, I do a lot of fitness and things like that and weight loss with the kids I work with. The best thing about where I'm at is I have everything I need in there. I have a boxing gym, full court basketball court, all right there in my center. I got a pool, basketball court, and boxing gym all in my recreational center. I'm trying to get the best of both worlds. So of course I'm in there boxing around with my guys; young national guys. And they be like, "I'm going to get you today." I like to work with 'em sometimes and give them a hard time. I didn't say when I left now how bad my feet was hurting. I ain't work in so long, my toes was hurting (laughing). But I'm really enjoying it, man.
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