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Add FightsATW on GoogleFloyd Mayweather is not going to fight Ryan Garcia.
And if you’ve been paying attention to Mayweather for the better part of the last decade, that shouldn’t come as much of a surprise.
Mayweather—a former five-division world champion, Olympic silver medalist, and arguably one of the finest boxers ever—has perfected the art of staying relevant long after his competitive career should have ended. He has an almost unparalleled ability to place his name back in the headlines, usually by dangling the possibility of a fight that, for one reason or another, never materializes.
This isn’t new. It has been part of the Mayweather playbook for years.
You could argue it began before his last truly legitimate fight, against Andre Berto in 2015, although his 2017 bout with Conor McGregor did, technically, count toward his professional record.
Let’s go back to April 2, 2014.
Mayweather posted on what was then Twitter: “I’m going to let the fans vote. Tell me who I should fight next. (Amir) Khan or (Marcos) Maidana?”
It was an irresistible proposition. Surely, people thought, Mayweather was finally going to give the public what it wanted. He was going to fight the man the fans selected. Perhaps, for once, the result of a fan vote would actually determine his next opponent.
Not exactly.
Amir Khan won the poll. Mayweather chose the loser: Marcos Maidana and he didn’t merely fight Maidana once. He fought him twice.
Their first bout, in May 2014, proved considerably more competitive than many had anticipated. Mayweather ultimately prevailed by majority decision. Five months later, the two met again, with Mayweather winning a unanimous decision in the rematch.
Then, in his next fight, Mayweather finally fought the man fans had spent the previous six years demanding he fight: Manny Pacquiao. The road to that fight was almost as ridiculous as the wait itself.
The two were in serious negotiations in 2010, but the fight fell apart over Olympic-style drug testing. Mayweather wanted what he described as a “level playing field,” while Pacquiao wanted the blood testing cutoff to come 14 days before the fight.
Pacquiao argued that excessive blood testing could weaken him. And, at the time, he had a legitimate argument: drawing blood can cause temporary weakness. Mayweather, however, maintained that if the two sides could not agree on the testing protocol, there would be no fight.
So let’s move to 2015.
Mayweather won a unanimous decision over Pacquiao. That wasn’t particularly shocking. Most observers expected him to win. Then, four months later, the story got considerably more interesting. Hall of Fame writer Thomas Hauser reported that Mayweather had received an intravenous infusion of saline and vitamins shortly before the Pacquiao fight, an infusion that exceeded the threshold permitted under World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) rules.
The United States Anti-Doping Agency subsequently granted Mayweather a retroactive therapeutic-use exemption roughly three weeks after the fight. The Nevada State Athletic Commission, however, had not granted an exemption.
So after years of preaching about a “level playing field,” Mayweather had managed to navigate a drug-testing controversy of his own without facing meaningful punishment and that is boxing in a nutshell.
There is always another loophole. Another technicality. Another powerful person willing to make a phone call. If you have enough money, enough influence, and enough people invested in the event succeeding, the rules can suddenly become remarkably flexible.
Ryan Garcia knows that all too well.
In 2024, Garcia tested positive for ostarine following his upset victory over longtime rival Devin Haney, a result that was subsequently overturned to a no contest. Garcia’s team maintained that he had not knowingly taken the banned substance and argued that contaminated supplements were responsible.
One of those supplements was NutraBio SuperCarb. NutraBio strongly denied that its product was responsible and said independent testing of the same batch found no ostarine. The contamination explanation ultimately did not prevent the New York State Athletic Commission from sanctioning Garcia. He was suspended for one year, fined $10,000, and had his victory over Haney overturned.
Which brings us back to Mayweather. Because apparently one Mayweather-Pacquiao saga wasn’t enough. The rematch now being discussed for Netflix was supposed to happen eight years ago.
Don’t remember? Let me help.
On the night Canelo Alvarez was preparing to rematch then-two-belt middleweight champion Gennadiy Golovkin in Las Vegas, Mayweather announced on Instagram that he was coming out of retirement in 2018 to fight Pacquiao again.
The timing was not subtle.
Mayweather’s announcement came on the same day as one of the biggest fights in boxing, and reporters who had traveled to Las Vegas to cover Canelo-Golovkin suddenly had another story to chase: Mayweather and Pacquiao were supposedly fighting again.
Did the fight happen?
No.
Did it even come particularly close?
Not really.
It was a classic Mayweather maneuver: announce something enormous, dominate the conversation, and let the proposed fight disappear once the headlines have served their purpose. Eight years later, we’re apparently doing it again.
Mayweather’s proposed return against Pacquiao became entangled in a separate legal dispute with CSI Entertainment, which sued Mayweather in federal court in June 2026. CSI alleges that it had an exclusive agreement covering two Mayweather events—an exhibition with Mike Tyson and a professional rematch with Pacquiao—and that it advanced a total of $4.65 million under those arrangements. Mayweather has disputed aspects of the contractual claims.
The larger point, however, is not the lawsuit. It is the pattern.
Mayweather spent years telling the boxing public that he was going to fight Pacquiao again. Now, after years of exhibitions, announcements, and failed negotiations, we’re still talking about Mayweather coming back to fight somebody who resembles a legitimate opponent.
And now it’s Ryan Garcia.
Mayweather wants us to believe that this one is different.
No.
Even if the fight somehow materializes, does anyone seriously believe we’re going to get the kind of fight that Garcia’s supporters are demanding? Garcia has publicly insisted that he wants a sanctioned professional fight, not another exhibition, while reports indicate that discussions between the two camps are underway.
But a legitimate professional fight between Mayweather and Garcia would require Mayweather, at 49, to return to the sport against a fighter 21 years his junior. And if this actually happens, you can expect negotiations over weight, rehydration, gloves, rounds, and any number of other conditions.
Maybe it’s 160 pounds. Maybe it’s 165. Maybe it’s some other catchweight designed to make the spectacle palatable to both sides. But that is precisely the point. We’ve been here before.
Mayweather has spent the better part of eight years talking about coming back to fight real opposition. Eight years of announcements. Eight years of rumors. Eight years of supposed mega-fights that somehow never seem to materialize as advertised.
And we’re still having this conversation.
At some point, you have to stop believing the announcement and start believing the history. Floyd Mayweather is not going to fight Ryan Garcia. And if I’m wrong, I’ll be happy to eat those words.
But I’ve heard this one before.
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