Khabib Nurmagomedov’s manager, Ali Abdelaziz, has revealed that a major move was made to try to broker a boxing match between Floyd Mayweather and the UFC champion, and said UFC president Dana White was on board with the idea.
Nurmagomedov announced his retirement after defeating Justin Gaethje to take his perfect professional record to 29-0 at UFC 254 last October, but stories linking him with a competitive return have been near-constant ever since.
UFC president Dana White has made no secret of his desire to get the undefeated lightweight champion back into the cage in 2021, and has stated his intention to ramp up those efforts if Conor McGregor defeats Dustin Poirier in the first pay-per-view event of the new year, UFC 257, on Jan. 23.
And now Abdelaziz has revealed that a huge bid was made to book a boxing match between Mayweather and Khabib in a blockbuster fight between two unbeaten legends of their respective sports.
“Listen, we got offered $100 million to fight Floyd Mayweather,” Abdelaziz told TMZ.
“Dana White was on board, everybody was on board. But, you know, Khabib is an MMA fighter. If Floyd wanted to come to fight [in an MMA bout], get his little ass whooped, no problem.”
Of course, there was never any chance that Mayweather would agree to face an elite MMA fighter inside the cage, let alone a world champion who has dominated the best multi-discipline fighters on the planet.
But it didn’t stop Mayweather’s camp from pushing for the boxing match, with Khabib revealing to Yahoo Sports ahead of his bout with Gaethje that he’d been offered $100 million on multiple occasions.
“Every month, people call me and they ask me, ‘you going to fight with Floyd Mayweather if we pay you $100 million?'” he said back in October.
“It’s crazy. I want to be focused on Justin Gaethje, please. Every month, some people from Saudi Arabia, from Emirates, from a lot of countries, always try to make contract with me.”
With his repeated attempts to arrange a bout with Khabib repeatedly rebuffed, Mayweather has moved on to book a much-mocked exhibition bout with YouTuber and 0-2 boxer Logan Paul, which will take place on pay-per-view on Feb. 20.
