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MAGNO'S BULGING MAIL SACK: SPENCE-CRAWFORD, MAYWEATHER VS. SUGAR RAY

By Paul Magno | April 06, 2023
MAGNO'S BULGING MAIL SACK: SPENCE-CRAWFORD, MAYWEATHER VS. SUGAR RAY

Welcome to a special Easter edition of Magno’s Bulging Mail Sack. With painted huevos, Peeps residue on my goatee, and little fluffy bunnies on my mind, let’s dig into my bulging sack. This week, we have comments and questions regarding Spence-Crawford stories and a fantasy Floyd Mayweather-Sugar Ray Robinson matchup.

Spence-Crawford?

Hi Paul.

Ring Magazine is reporting that Errol Spence vs. Terence Crawford is happening on June 17 and that it’ll be announced officially on the Gervonta Davis-Ryan Garcia card. Other news outlets have been starting to pick up this story as well. But Crawford just posted on Twitter something about it still being April Fool’s Day. Dan Rafael is also saying that his sources are telling him the fight is not a done deal and that it definitely won’t be happening on June 17. What’s the truth here? Do you have any insight on Spence-Crawford?

– Damon

Hey Damon.

I hate to be the one to break it to you, but the boxing media is awful. The news gathering process in this industry basically consists of talking to a “source,” who is always an industry insider with a vested interest in “sharing” some bit of strategically leaked info (whether accurate or not), and then running to print with it...because “scoops” get clicks. That’s it. There’s no cross-checking of facts/info, there’s no vetting of anything, there’s no critical thought put into anything spoon fed to them. They just grab the info and push it forward. And if/when the story turns out to be erroneous, there’s no accountability for posting the incorrect, poorly-vetted story because media members don’t hold other media members accountable, especially if they belong to the same fraternal order of boxing media. 

So, it would be wise to take everything you see and hear from boxing media with a gigantic grain of salt until it’s publicly confirmed by the fighters and their people. Learn to interact with the boxing media like I do with my 6-year-old niece when she tells me some tall tale. Listen, grin, nod, and say stuff like, “Mmmm, hmmm...really? That’s nice. Wow, that sounds cool.” Then, just keep going on with your life.

Having said that, I have no idea if the Spence-Crawford story is true or not. Nobody does, other than the Spence-Crawford people, themselves. We’ll have to wait and see. 

Mayweather vs. Sugar Ray

Magno. 

Seeing as how you work for FloydHype and could probably use a raise (if you make any money at all), I’m going to pitch you a softball question so you can have the opportunity to score some brownie points with your simp boss. 

Who wins: Welterweight Floyd Mayweather Jr. or welterweight Sugar Ray Robinson?

I’ll be anxious to see how you twist logic around so you can say Floyd KOs Sugar Ray.

– Mark

Hey Mark.

I’m gonna pretend that your passive-aggressive mean girl email was an actual question and not just a desperate cry for my attention. 

There’s no way you could arrive at any reasonable answer to the question you pose. There’s a group of boxing fandom who will insist that the only right answer is Sugar Ray over Floyd, big. There’s another group who will insist on Floyd over Sugar Ray. Both sides are just talking out their asses. 

There are just so many variables and intangibles and era-by-era differences in the fight game that coming up with any definitive cross-generational “who wins” answer is pure fantasy and wishful thinking.

If a time machine existed, we could take both Mayweather and Robinson in their primes and have them battle on some neutral Limbo-like plain with PPV camera access. But, obviously, that’s impossible.

If you took Robinson out of the past and placed him in the here and now, in the era of one or two fights a year and eight-figure paydays, where there is a dearth of old school quality trainers and a general atrophy that comes from more cautious, future payday-minded matchmaking, would he still be the same Sugar Ray? 

If you took Mayweather into the past and kept him busy, hungry, and dependent on big, risky performances for his paychecks, if you fortified his skills with some true tests from grizzled, old school pros and environments where he wasn’t always the smartest boxing mind in the room, would he be the same “Money?”

One could argue that Mayweather, with his instincts and raw ability, would be a significantly better fighter if he came up in the 40s and 50s-- probably not undefeated, but overall better. It could also be argued that Sugar Ray, if he came up in the present day boxing environment, despite his own built-in assets, would not be as sharp or as battle-wise as he was in his own day. 

Fighters, like any other athletes (or any other human beings, actually), are products of their times and there’s no way to prove that any particular time, filtered through any specific person, produces something better than any other era. 

Hell, maybe Robinson would be even better as a present tense fighter and maybe Mayweather would fall to pieces fighting in Robinson’s day.

Who the hell knows and who the hell can say whether any boxer is better than any other boxer without them actually stepping into the ring against one another under absolutely neutral conditions?

Until the laws of physics and the space-time continuum can be bent to facilitate boxing fantasy matchups, this legend vs. legend stuff is all message board nerd talk.

See how polite and professional I was to a complete jerk-off asshole? Happy Easter, dick head.

Got a question (or hate mail) for Magno’s Bulging Mail Sack? The best of the best gets included in the weekly mailbag segment right here at FightHype. Send your stuff here: paulmagno@theboxingtribune.com.

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