You’re reminded often in this business – especially in the coverage of boxing – to apply the sniff test to certain stories.

Floyd Mayweather Jnr suing Showtime and its former president Stephen Espinoza for more than $340 million in misappropriated funds nearly 10 years after he fought on the premium cable network seems amiss.

BoxingScene colleague Jake Donovan wrote that in the complaint, filed in California, that Mayweather alleges aiding and abetting breach of fiduciary duty, civil conspiracy to commit fraud, conversion and unjust enrichment by Showtime/Espinoza.

Turning 49 later this month, the retired 50-0 Hall of Famer, who has been in talks to perhaps participate in an exhibition with former heavyweight champion Mike Tyson or a rematch with eight-division champion Manny Pacquiao this year, alleges funds were diverted by Espinoza to Mayweather’s longtime adviser, Al Haymon.

Haymon, who runs Premier Boxing Champions, was not named in the lawsuit, but an individual familiar with the case said the expectation is a second lawsuit against one of the sport’s most powerful men will follow.

At this moment, the case appears to be a prime example of biting the hands that feed you.

Time and again during his career, Mayweather – while often reigning as the world’s richest athlete in Forbes’ annual rankings – hailed Haymon as the savior who got him out of an unfavorable union with Top Rank Chairman Bob Arum and set him on his way to the fame-making 2007 victory over Oscar De La Hoya.

From there, it was former De La Hoya attorney Espinoza who, as Showtime Sports’ head, pushed all of his proverbial chips to the table in a one-sided split that convinced Mayweather to leave HBO for a six-fight alliance with Showtime. Their run together featured fights with Canelo Alvarez (2013), and a doubleheader with Marcos Maidana (2014) and the historic showdown with Pacquiao (2015).

A novelty 2017 bout versus UFC champion Conor McGregor followed on Showtime.

The Pacquiao fight generated more than a record $600 million with an estimated 4.6 million pay-per-view buys, and the McGregor bout is the second richest prizefight in history.

Perhaps this is just a misunderstanding resulting from revisionist calculations.

In addition to the small cut – believed to be less than 10% – that Mayweather bouts would generate for Showtime, a heftier percentage – around 30% of total revenue – was required to be set aside and paid to the satellite and cable distributors including DirecTV, Dish Network and others during that era, industry officials explain.

Has Mayweather neglected to consider that while tallying this all up today?

Has he fallen on hard times as a recent Business Insider story indicated?

Is his new management team – after disposing of longtime Mayweather Promotions President Leonard Ellerbe – putting him up to this?

Mayweather and his prior team certainly were calculating the money that was coming in during the height of the Showtime relationship. 

Why didn’t any of them speak up then if there was a shortfall?

By alleging that Showtime might have wrongfully retained any of the $340 million, wouldn’t such extra funds have been able to allow the network’s boxing operation to keep its doors open?

Showtime shuttered its boxing coverage in 2023.

At first glance, this story might have the appearance of that age-old tale of the business suits taking advantage of the fighter.

Upon the sniff test, however, perhaps it’s instead the time-honored tale of the great champion wasting so much of his fortune and wondering in the desperation of his later years where it all went.

Lance Pugmire is BoxingScene’s senior U.S. writer and an assistant producer for ProBox TV. Pugmire has covered boxing since the early 2000s, first at the Los Angeles Times and then at The Athletic and USA Today. He won the Boxing Writers’ Association of America’s Nat Fleischer Award in 2022 for career excellence.