Arran and Rolly talk generational divides and fights that fell apart
Arran McLachlan: There’s a famous boxing writer from back in the 50’s named AJ Liebling who was writing about Rocky Marciano and all of these guys of the time, and he lived through the invention of the TV, and networks starting to show fights. He wrote an article saying that showing boxing for free on TV is killing the audience of people that are willing to pay for the sport and actually attend in person, and he was predicting back in the 50s that tv would be the death of the sport because of new technology. It’s a similar thing to what we’re seeing today, that people who were willing to pay for pay-per-views can now just go onto their streaming sites. It’s not the same level of investment.
Rolly: Yeah, I mean like, the thing is the people that will buy boxing fights are the ones that aren’t boxing fans. Now you get the other problem. The exhibitions, the YouTube fights, that do this to death. So if you’re a casual boxing fan and you think Logan Paul is a real boxer, right? We can’t say anything about Jake. Jake’s actually legit fighter, he trains hard, all this stuff, right? But let’s say, like, Logan Paul versus KSI. Oh, it looks good for the sport. But now you see an actual true boxing fight after and it’s a technical chess match and you’re like, what is this? It completely perverts the whole boxing landscape.
Arran McLachlan: Yeah like all of the exhibitions, we have the Floyd Mayweather – Manny Pacquiao rematch maybe happening. Do you feel like Floyd kinda stole your Manny fight?
Rolly: Let them fight bro. Let me explain something to you like this. I was gonna fight Pacquiao after he fought Barrios, and we had the whole stuff set up and all this stuff, right? And this is in uh, he fought July 19th with Barrios. We negotiated for two, three months. We had everything said and all this stuff – he kept begging for more money, and then the deal was blown about two and a half months in. That’s that was July 19th. So by October the fight was blown. Floyd didn’t come into the picture til December? Nah he didn’t steal my fight.
Arran McLachlan: Why do you think it fell apart?
Rolly: Yeah, I just didn’t want to fight me because he knows he’ll get flatlined and he knows that’s his last payday. Now you want to hear my mindset on it though? I didn’t want to fight Pacquiao. I really didn’t, but it was the most lucrative option at the time and it would have put me in the hall of fame, or at least they could have tried to make a claim because they’re always going to try to make a claim against me, but the thing is with Manny Pacquiao is I would have never got my credit. I would have never got my credit. I didn’t want to fight this grandpa. Even just to know the fact that he came out of retirement, why did he come out of retirement after five years? Do you think you really want to be a champion? You’re an 8 division world champion? What do you think, he really wants to be a champion?
Arran McLachlan: He’s kind of already accomplished everything.
Rolly: But like I kept saying I don’t want to fight him, but they kept pressing it and then I’m like, “okay let’s do it,” and then they’re begging for way more money when they can’t even sell anymore. It don’t make sense, right? We know what it was. I mean, it would have been like I said, a ticket to the hall of fame, you know, or at least for me to try to claim, right? But I would have never got my credit. He would’ve been knocked out cold, hands down, and like I said, if I’m really an easy fight, they would have just took it. It was a great offer. He was making more money than I was.
Arran McLachlan: Yeah, it sucks for you that that fight didn’t happen, I get that you weren’t interested in it, but just financially and also the time spent.
Rolly: The same thing with Conor Benn and me. Me and Conor Benn had the whole fight deal lined up from May 30th at the Barclays Center in New York. Everything. Even when we had the whole thing where he comes up to me at the Teofimo fight, they were like “Oh you know we gotta promote this fight, we gotta promote this fight.”
I’m like, bro, I don’t do fake beef. You know? I like Conor Benn bro, dude, the dude invited me to go to the club with him, bro. But I don’t do fake beef! I’m telling you right we had the whole deal done! He’s saying all this “Oh man, come on, give me opportunity” and all this stuff, and we already had the whole deal done! I’m like, that’s why I thought you’re seeing me here? And then that’s when all that stuff happened, right? He tried to play the big tough guy. Now you’re just showing everyone he’s a clout chaser. He just did it for clout. He knows he’s not like that.
Arran McLachlan: Do you think he’s going to fight Ryan (Garcia)?
Rolly: I don’t know. I don’t believe anything Ryan Garcia ever says. Tell me how many times bro, name to me how many people Ryan’s called out in the last few, I don’t know; he said he’s going to drop down to 140 to fight Shakur (Stevenson)? He knows I’ll fight him and beat him up again. He called out Devin (Haney). He called out Conor Benn. He called out Pacquiao. Yeah, he’s called out…who else has he called out? Everyone.
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