massari":2dccwspf said:
But you've never seen a male striker of Floyds caliber vs a woman grappler before. Obviously everyone knew what was going to happen to Toney because he was fighting another man who was a former champ. There was the time Ray Mercer KO'd Tim Sylvia though. Yeah, when it comes to pro male boxer vs pro male MMArtist, obviously the MMA guy would be the favorite most of the time.
Yeah I agree that Floyd wouldn't be able to hang with almost any guy in the UFC, even the 125ers. Punchers chance and that's all.
Sylvia's kind of a unique guy, though. On the one hand, he was the heavyweight champ for a time. But on the other, Tim Sylvia was never a technical fighter, and by 2009 wasn't even in fighting shape. He'd have fought for a steak dinner, I bet.
I see your point regarding the male boxer vs female grappler, though, and you're right. We'd have to see. I just don't think it's as disparate as you believe. In order for Mayweather's boxing to be viable in MMA, he'd really need to unlearn many things. The traditional boxer stance, with the lead leg, makes it an easy target for a single leg. Boxers are conditioned not to punch low, so a low single or double leg take down (such as what Couture used) is about as easy as it's going to ever be. I get that a punch would end the fight. But I don't give him as much of a chance of landing that punch as you do. Mayweather would have a huge strength advantage against a female like Rousey. That's the real question, for me. Would his strength advantage be enough? He's going to be able to King Kong his way out of some submissions, but I've seen technical grapplers submit much stronger bruisers many times.
But, all that said, it's never going to happen. As I said before, this will always be speculation because Mayweather just has nothing to gain, and everything to lose. And while I agree that Cyborg vs Rousey is only interesting fight left for Rousey, a catch weight is very unlikely. There was talk about a catch weight fight between Anderson Silva and GSP for a time when both fighters were at the top of their game, and it never happened. There was then talk about Silva moving up to fight Jon Jones in a catch weight. This made more sense, because Silva had many fights at Light Heavyweight. But that ultimately never happened either.
There's little to gain for either of them, at least, not until they're both long in the tooth and struggling to remain relevant, in maybe 8 or 10 years. So, they'll each talk big until that happens, and if Rousey's movie career takes off, Cyborg will be out of luck.