Miguel Torres had some rather choice words for boxing superstar Floyd Mayweather, who has been quite a vocal detractor of MMA, voicing his lack of respect for the sport on more than one occasion.   Floyd recently showed his class and social maturity by stating that MMA is "for beer drinkers" while deeming its competitors as "animals", and, with the ever-popular caveat attached absolving himself of racism, that "there's no white fighters dominating in boxing, so they had to go do something else."  (Video at bloodyelbow.com) Torres spoke with Yahoo Sports and pulled no punches with his responses to Mayweather's coarse comments.

"I would love to fight Mayweather, just because of the simple fact that I think he's a cocky asshole."

With Torres being the popular and exciting champ of the WEC's 135 lbs. division, and Floyd participating in boxing at a similar weight, this is the first time that a somewhat logical and compatible opponent for Floyd has returned fire from the MMA sidelines.  Torres continues to provide a brief assessment of how their hypothetical fight would unfold:

"Well, I'm not a white person, and I will smash his ass. I don't care. His style of boxing is all built on getting people in the clinch. He'll hit them, and then he'll get in the clinch with them. Then the referee breaks them, and he'll hit them and grab them again. I think it's a great strategy. It's not clean boxing, but it's smart boxing. He's going to hit somebody and grab them in MMA, and he'll be done for. They'll take him down. That'll be all. I'll be on top of the list to fight him."

The testosterone-fueled banter begs the question that most MMA fans and fighters believed was answered in UFC 1:  does a singularly-proficient fighter like a boxer stand a chance against a fighter with a more diversified style in each of the three phases (free phase/stand-up, clinch, grappling) of full-contact fighting?  The entire history of MMA vehemently disagrees with Mr. Mayweather, although admittedly the sport hasn't seen a boxer of Floyd's caliber, who is indeed talented.  Considering his style is much more based on fluidity and grace than outright punching power, he would risk being snared into entirely unfamiliar territory every time he planted his feet in order to throw a punch, and this alien and shark-infested territory would be far outside the range of his combat specialties. As an MMA enthusiast through and through, I find it difficult to completely nullify certain aspects of Floyd's beer drinking and animal comments, with Brock Lesnar's twisted snarl as he menaced PPV viewers while slobbering drool from behind the cage still haunting my fragile thoughts.  His post-fight diatribe regarding Bud Light vs. Coors hardly helped our case either. Let's hope the questions can truly be answered if Floyd ever dares to prove his superiority by participating in MMA, and I think Torres would be a perfect opponent were the miracle to happen.

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