WBO Strips Mayweather of Welterweight Title
June 7, 2015 (The Sports Xchange) — The WBO stripped Floyd Mayweather of his welterweight world title on Monday after he failed to surrender his titles from two other organizations.
Mayweather defeated Manny Pacquiao on May 2 in a 147-pound unification fight. He earned more than $220 million from the most lucrative fight in history.
He was supposed to pay a $200,000 sanctioning fee by last Friday and vacate the middleweight titles he also holds from the WBC and WBA. Boxers are not allowed to hold world titles in multiple weight classes, but the WBC and WBA had been breaking their rules.
“The WBO world championship committee is allowed no other alternative but to cease to recognize Mr. Floyd Mayweather Jr. as the WBO welterweight champion of the world and vacate his title for failing to comply with our WBO regulations of world championship contests,” the WBO wrote Monday.
Mayweather, 38, had requested an Aug. 1 deadline to decide, but the WBO already had given him more than the standard 10 post-fight days. He has 14 days to appeal the group’s decision.
In the meantime, Timothy Bradley Jr. has replaced Mayweather as WBO’s champion. Bradley beat Jessie Vargas on June 27.
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