Last Saturday, after six years of negotiations, Floyd Mayweather and Manny Pacquiao at last stepped into the ring. Hordes of boxing fans and celebrities piled into the MGM Grand in Las Vegas and millions more all over the world tuned into the fight on television. Everyone was expecting something worthy of being called ‘The Fight of The Century’. But what they got was far from that.

For $100, people at home could get the fight on Showtime Pay-Per-View. Now, most people are probably regretting this decision, with many believing it to be boring and uneventful.

A variety of factors played into the fact that the Manny Pacquiao and Floyd Mayweather “Superfight” was a big disappointment.

First, the six years that we had to wait for the fighters to finally agree on terms and to actually have the fight is a long time for people to be able to discuss and think. Obviously people did not begin to seriously talk about the fight until February 20, 2015, when the fight contract was officially signed by both athletes, but this is still an immense amount of time to be looking forward to a single sporting event.

Second, the hype that was created before the fight on HBO/Showtime was in my opinion too much. The vast amount of interviews and time, simply took way too long. The last undercard bout finished around an hour and a half before the main event. In my opinion, they had to just get to the fight.

Next, there was competition from other sports on that night. People could have tuned in (for free I may add) to TNT to watch an NBA Western Conference Playoffs Game 7 between the San Antonio Spurs and the Los Angeles Clippers, and would have gotten a much entertainment value than the fight. Simply put, the Spurs and Clippers game was more entertaining than MayPac, and after seeing this in hindsight, people are upset they spent a huge amount of time and money on the fight instead of the basketball game.

Lastly, the nature of the boxers themselves created a product unworthy of the hype. The fact that Floyd Mayweather is great at dictating the pace of his fights, and has great defense while in the ring, caused the fight to not be as action packed as many people had hoped.

Also, Pacquiao was farther from his prime than Mayweather. Within the past couple days, news has come out that Pacquiao fought with an injured rotator cuff, an injury he sustained during his training in April. If he knew of this injury before the fight, then why would he then carry on with the fight, knowing he would be at a huge disadvantage with such an injury? Simply put, the answer is money. As said in an article on USA Today, Pacquiao in his prime would have postponed the fight in order to be healthy. Money was the reason he didn’t wait to get healthy.

I personally was rooting for Pacquiao, but I am blaming him for making the wrong choice in the situation he was in. He did not wait to fight Mayweather until he was healthy. In team sports, there is no chance to move around the date of the event because of an injury, the team must move on and find a replacement if their star player is out. But in the case of boxing, when it is just one on one, why would one go into the ring knowing they were injured? That’s dumb.

In a developing storyline from earlier this week, Floyd Mayweather said via a text to ESPN’s Stephen A. Smith, “I will fight him in a year after his surgery”. This is a big development, after Mayweather had previously said that he would not allow a rematch if he were to beat Pacquiao. If this does end up actually happening, I personally think that this will be another big event. Even though so many people are disappointed in the product of last Saturday’s fight, I believe that people will give these fighters, and the entire sport of boxing another chance.

In an event that couldn’t possibly live up to the hype, a mixture of different factors and happenings combined into making “The Fight of the Century” into “The Flop of the Century”.

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