Former pound-for-pound superstar Floyd Mayweather once revealed that he was glad to have not crossed paths with one fighter in particular during his career.
The Michigan-native remained unbeaten for the duration of his accomplished career, winning world titles in no less than five weight classes along the way.
Mayweather proved to be one of the most dominant fighters of the 2000s and 2010s, producing victories over the likes of Oscar De La Hoya, Shane Mosley, Ricky Hatton and Manny Pacquiao during this period.
The five-division world champion called time on his professional career back in 2017, shortly after he stopped MMA fighter Conor McGregor in the 11th round of their crossover showdown in Las Vegas.
Speaking to Fight Hype, Mayweather reflected on his decorated career as he admits he was relieved to have not crossed paths with Mexico’s Antonio Margarito.
“Antonio Margarito said over and over again that I was afraid of him. He was pressing, and he wanted to fight so badly, because he was beating fighters with loaded gloves (with ‘casts’), so I’m glad God didn’t let that fight happen. Because you don’t know what kind of effect it would have had on me.
“Those (punches) would have wreaked havoc after my boxing career was over. He could have ended up killing me in the ring, you don’t know what could happen. So sometimes you have certain signals (to face fighters or not), I was never afraid of him and at that particular moment it didn’t make sense for us to fight.”
Despite winning multiple versions of the world welterweight championship during his tenure, Margarito is perhaps best known for being caught using illegal hand wraps prior to his showdown with Shane Mosley in 2009.
Mosley got the better of Margarito on the night however, stopping the Mexican in the ninth round of their Los Angeles bout to capture the WBA world welterweight title in one of his finest career performances.
