TALKIN TURKEY WITH GAT: Bud Got “Money” To Burn

—Ayn Rand

Some of them, fighters of a voluminous oasis of want, don't want water to go anywhere, nor do they have any need to drain what some would consider ‘The Swamp'.

Dig enough dirt you'll find it on anyone. In the case of Floyd Mayweather, 42, thirst quenching pugilistic iconoclast robed in all-time great, he ain't especially hard to find. He spent the better part of two decades turning hate into a haven; simultaneously turning those who'd designated him craven, into desperate ravens hovering around barren trees in the hopes of fulfilling cravings long satisfied. But Terence “Bud” Crawford, WBO welterweight champion worth so many bags of hemp, isn't exactly a scavenger. At 32, this is the bald eagle that chases the owl into the night. All of them. But in this, now his day, he finds himself a bird of too much prey, one other's find in possession of talons too sharp to come out and play.

Sure, Lithuanian badass Egidijus Kavaliauskas (just call him “Mean Machine, it ain't worth it) will mean business on December 14 at Madison Square Garden, but that won't necessarily mean good business. The aroma of Bud worked his way around IBF welterweight champion Errol Spence in Oklahoma City way back in the fall of 2018 and had many of us in boxing wanting some of that smoke. But a mere con and a real messy run in with a porter later, followed by a accident from hell straight out of “Ferris Bueller's Day Off”, has rendered that to a party of ashes — for now. So on the eve of birds being sliced with assorted gravy, thoughts of Crawford's “Why not?” overture to Mayweather conjures a serious, “Why not?” This is something I'd broached before, owed to life's long standing tradition of passing the torch; for the past, must at some point, cede to the future in gift wrapped present terms.

But these are times unique to any aspect of world history. They are so unique in fact, that Mayweather can effectively burn any notion that nullifies his standing among the pantheon of greats by smoking some real 🔥 at age 43. Something he's never done before at any time of his legendary career. Crawford, pound-for-pound world #1 in the trained eyes of many, would be a far superior Zab Judah in front of a Floyd really last seen around my birthday in 2015 against Andre Berto. Pretend it's a piece of 🦃 for a second and chew on that folks. We're talking about an unbeaten, black southpaw fighter in his absolute prime and arguably the world's best fighter in front of “The Best Ever” with an asterisk. Crawford instantly becomes the superstar he's not during the promotion, while Mayweather can truly become Sugar Ray Robinson immortal with a win. And I'm sorry I gotta go there — it would defecate all over Sugar Ray Leonard's victory over Marvelous Marvin Hagler.

Bud knew that the whispers would grow into screams, that they'd absolutely go bullhorn on the Manny Pacquiao mantle of ascension over “Money”, were he to find “Pac-Man” and defeat a 30 year-old Keith “One-Time” Thurman at the improbable age of 40. He did.

This made Bud's call out of Money for a smokefest brilliant.

Here he is asking questions of greatness, as if what's in front of him in a few weeks won't even be allowed to ask one. It speaks to a demand for answers of himself, in addition to a de facto answer Floyd would seemingly have to provide in lieu of Manny's incredible triumph, which as of now, positions his mantle above that of dude with “The Bag”. The spatula scraping encounter with Marquez is gone — just as Floyd's spacial exhibition with Nasukawa puts him in a thong. He smokes Bud, and it puts the exploits of B-Hop in an I-Hop to go bag with no condiments to appease the munchies. I don't believe he can do it — but I know he can. Where there's smoke there's usually Floyd.

“Happy Thanksgiving” everyone.