Showtime's Mark Kriegel: 'Floyd's The Opposite Of Tyson, He's A Real Tough Guy'
Bryan Altman, CBS Local Sports
Leading up to the Sept. 12 bout between Floyd Mayweather and Andre Berto, CBS Local Sports has been hosting boxing personalities on our Mayweather-Berto live blog for a Q&A with boxing fans. Our most recent guest was Showtime boxing analyst and best selling author Mark Kriegel, who fielded questions from fans regarding Mayweather vs. Berto, Floyd Mayweather's best boxing moment, and his reasoning for choosing Andre Berto for his 49th and final fight.
One of the most interesting moments in the Q&A came when Kriegel was asked what he felt was Floyd's best fight ever.
"Best Floyd fight - I like Maidana," Kriegel said in the Q&A. "I think Floyd's courage is underrated. He never complained about Maidana being rough with him. I think he's the opposite of Tyson by the way, I think he's a real tough guy. A guy like Tyson, when he found out he couldn't knock you out, he would crumble. When he found out that his power couldn't knock you out, mentally he crumbled. When Maidana started roughing Floyd up, he could deal with it."
From there, Kriegel recounted the best moment he's seen from Floyd in the ring, which came during Mayweather's bout with "Sugar" Shane Mosley in 2010.
MORE>> Follow Along On Fight Night On Our Mayweather-Berto Live Blog
"I know what the greatest moment was," Kriegel said. "It's when Mosley hits him with a right in the second round and it almost knocks him out. Then he grabs, and holds and regains his legs and composure, and then Mosley doesn't do anything the rest of that fight. To me, that was the best moment for Floyd."
As far as the fight on Saturday goes, Kriegel thinks that fans are in for an entertaining fight and he thinks that's because Mayweather planned it to be that way when he selected Andre Berto as his opponent.
"He's got to bring it," Kriegel said of Berto. "I think it'll make for an entertaining fight, but I think it'll make for a Floyd knockout. And that's why I think Floyd picked this fight. So he can say, 'see, I knocked this guy out.' The only knock on Floyd's record is that he hasn't knocked anyone out since Victor Ortiz in 2002."
Kriegel, who will be covering the fight for Showtime in Las Vegas this weekend, is also a renowned author and has spent decades covering all different major sporting events. But Super Bowls, championship games and the like don't hold a candle to being at and covering the biggest events in the boxing world if you ask Kriegel.
"Let me speak personally here," Kriegel said. "My favorite sport to cover, is boxing. My favorite sport to be at, is boxing. The brilliance of football, across generations now, is that it's perfectly choreographed for television. But boxing is intimate. It's something that when you see it up close, you can be both horrified, but awed at its magnificence. There's no sporting event as intimate and intense as being ringside for a big-ass fight."
Regardless of how it all goes down, Mayweather has had a brilliant boxing career. And on top of that, he's done a masterful job of turning himself into what Kriegel calls "the most lucrative persona in all of sports."
On Saturday night, we'll see if the most lucrative persona in all of sports can remain undefeated and avoid the upset at the hands of Andre Berto.
Bryan Altman is, for some reason, an unabashed fan of the Rangers, Jets and Mets. If he absolutely had to pick a basketball team it would be the Knicks, but he'd gladly trade them for just one championship for either of his other three teams.
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