Free-for-all! Mayweather-Gotti bout devolves into melee after fight called

An exhibition boxing match between Floyd Mayweather Jr. and John Gotti III ended in a scrum Saturday after the bout was called early.

Referee Kenny Bayliss stopped the fight in the sixth round after warning both boxers to tone down the trash talk, according to CNN. Gotti ignored the referee’s signal and continued throwing shots at Mayweather.

That prompted Mayweather’s team to storm the ring and corner Gotti, causing Gotti’s team to come to its fighter’s defense.

The chippy action spread from the ring to the stands, with BBC reporting that multiple people got into fights around the arena and backstage at the FLA Live Arena in Sunrise, Florida. Police responded by threatening to arrest anyone who didn’t clear out of the stadium.

“That’s why they pay the big bucks, because I put on a show,” Mayweather said in a video posted after the fight. 

Mayweather, 46, has fought five exhibition bouts since retiring from professional boxing with a 50-0 record in 2017.  

Gotti, 30, is the grandson of the late New York crime boss John Gotti. He became a professional boxer last year. 

The bad blood in the ring started when Mayweather got under Gotti’s skin by outboxing the younger opponent. Gotti began putting Mayweather in headlocks and clinches to reestablish the pace, but the moves led to more trash-talking and ultimately the fight’s stoppage with no decision.

Gotti and his family weren’t done coming after Mayweather even after the fights ended in and out of the ring. The younger fighter called the celebrated boxer an “enemy for life,” and his sister Nicolette referred to Mayweather’s team as a “pack of zoo animals.”