Watch Floyd Mayweather vs. Conor McGregor’s London press conference
The MayMac press tour faces the challenge of picking up the pieces Friday after a disaster in Brooklyn.


The world press tour of Conor McGregor and Floyd Mayweather Jr. peaked in Toronto with a fun and entertaining event, then came crashing down to Earth with a disaster in New York on Thursday.
Now, the tour will try to pick up the pieces and end on a high note in London, despite heightened tensions and hostility.
Coverage of the event is scheduled to begin at 2 p.m. ET with Showtime, as well as the UFC, providing a free stream on YouTube, although both fighters are prone to showing up late. It will also be televised on Fox Sports 2 and can be streamed on the Fox Sports GO App.
In Toronto, McGregor stole the show with the crowd on his side. He had some pointed insults for Mayweather and even jabbed at Showtime executive Steven Espinoza, accusing the network of cutting off his microphone during the first stop of the tour in Los Angeles.
But the momentum came to a halt Friday. The energy of the huge crowd at Barclays Center in Brooklyn was squandered by audio issues that made it difficult for fans to hear what was happening. But that may have been for the best because the show on stage was worse.
McGregor responded to accusations of racism by telling the crowd that he’s “half black from the belly button down” and then danced for his “beautiful, black female fans.” Mayweather showered McGregor in cash and then summoned his bodyguards to stir up trouble.
And just like that, the wit and banter that made Wednesday so fun had devolved into confusing chaos on Thursday that was equal parts offensive, boring, and cringeworthy. It teetered on the edge of becoming a melee and UFC president Dana White apologized on Instagram for what he called a “shitshow.”
After shrugging off McGregor’s insults from the first two days of the tour, Mayweather told MMA Fighting’s Ariel Helwani that the Irish mixed martial arts fighter crossed the line Thursday.
“You can’t do that,” Mayweather said. “Conor McGregor, you cannot disrespect black women. You cannot disrespect black people, period.”
Mayweather is far from a sympathetic character, though. The undefeated boxer has been convicted of domestic violence multiple times and unleashed a racist rant of his own in 2010 directed at Filipino boxer Manny Pacquiao.
With one last chance to get in their opponent’s head Friday, it’s unlikely that McGregor or Mayweather will hold back in the finale and will likely hurl their most heated insults. It’s the end of the world press tour and the pair won’t meet again until the week of the fight in August. At this point, that’s probably for the best.











