Mayweather to fight ex-reality TV star
After a recently announced bout against Muay Thai kickboxer Liam Harrison fell apart, Floyd Mayweather Jr. is reportedly pursuing a boxing match against Geordie Shore star Aaron Chalmers.
It feels like few fighters have spent as much of their retirement years taking fights as Floyd Mayweather. The multi-time, multi-division boxing champion more or less ended his time as a high-level professional athlete back in 2015, with a unanimous decision over Andre Berto to retain his undisputed welterweight titles. One last bout, to take his record to a sparkling 50-0 in 2017—against UFC superstar Conor McGregor—and the then-40-year-old officially hung up his gloves.
So what’s he been doing in the half-decade since he decided to stop boxing? More boxing, obviously.
Mayweather took his first exhibition bout back in 2018, a much derided shellacking of kickboxing star Tenshin Nasukawa. He returned again in 2021, for a bout against former Disney Kid and celebrity pugilist Logan Paul. In 2022, Mayweather fought three times: first against fellow unbeaten retiree Don Moore, then against RIZIN star Mikuru Asakura, and finally against YouTube celebrity Deji Olatunji.
Earlier this year, Mayweather announced that he had a new opponent lined up, 37-year-old Muay Thai kickboxer and ONE Championship fighter Liam Harrison. No sooner was the bout announced however, than both ONE and Harrison denied that the fight would take place. Harrison explained that, despite verbally agreeing to the contest, a preexisting knee injury proved too severe to move ahead with training. For their part, ONE stated that they had never been approached about Harrison taking the fight in any context.
All that leads to this latest announcement—which is much less surprising in context—that Mayweather will apparently be boxing former Bellator fighter and Geordie Shore cast-member Aaron Chalmers. Mayweather dropped the news via his Instagram account on Monday, January 23rd.
Chalmers started his combat sports journey back in 2017, with three wins under the now-defunct BAMMA MMA promotion. Those victories were enough to get him a Bellator contract, which resulted in four more bouts between 2018-2020. ‘The Joker’ hasn’t competed in MMA since a unanimous decision loss to Austin Clem back in 2020, at Bellator 240.
The now-35-year-old made his pro boxing debut last year, against 6-40-4 professional opponent Alexander Zeledon, defeating the Nicaraguan via four-round unanimous decision.
Mayweather vs. Chalmers is set to take place on February 25th at the O2 Arena in London, England. As of yet, no other bouts have been announced for the event.