Mayweather Jr stripped of title won after beating Pacquiao

In May, Floyd Mayweather beat Manny Pacquiao to win the World Boxing Organization’s (WBO) welterweight belt and took home more that $220 million for his trouble.

After the victory over Pacquiao, Mayweather stated that he would vacate those titles and hold onto to the welterweight title he had just won.

The World Boxing Council and World Boxing Association had been breaking their own rules by allowing Mayweather to hold their titles, but the WBO upheld its rules.

The rules also prohibit WBO champions to hold any belts in any other weight divisions.

Fighters are usually afforded a 10-day period to decide which class they wish to retain their titles in. The WBO gave Mayweather two months to decide before making the decision to strip the titles.

A statement published on wboboxing.com on Monday night read: “In the present case, Mr. Mayweather Jr. failed to pay the $200,000 fee required of him as a participant of a WBO World Championship Contest”. Reports suggest that he was given a Friday deadline to pay the WBO a sanction fee taken from the bout’s reported 300million United States dollar that he earned from that singer fight of the century.

Steve Marcus-Reuters Floyd Mayweather, Jr. celebrates after defeating Manny Pacquiao in their welterweight WBO, WBC and WBA (Super) title fight in Las Vegas, Nevada, May 2, 2015. “But in the meantime he’s enjoying a couple of hundred million he made from his last outing and this has zero impact on anything he does,” Mayweather Promotions CEO Leonard Ellerbe said.

ESPN’s Rafael says that Mayweather, 38, “plans to next fight September 12 – the opponent has not been announced – to complete his six-fight contract with Showtime/CBS”.

“The WBO has the utmost respect for Floyd Mayweather Jr. and all that he has accomplished during his storied career”.

After Mayweather won the belt, he expressed his intentions of vacating the newly awarded title saying, “I’ll talk to my team and see what we need to do”.