Mayweather the businessman sitting pretty

While talking on the phone recently, boxing champion Floyd Mayweather Jr told quarterback Tom Brady, “I’m going to come watch you play this year — a lot.”

The five-time Super Bowl winner with the New England Patriots replied, “Good. Take care of business.”

Mayweather, 40, again is insisting, as he prepares to meet UFC champion Conor McGregor on Saturday in a boxing match in Las Vegas, that he will retire afterward.

He’s expected to get more than the $240 million (Dh882 million) he cleared for defeating Manny Pacquiao in 2015 and said Tuesday that he will pursue an offensive battle to close his career at 50-0.

But what will the man who has devoted his life to boxing do when his career is over? “That’s a great question. Because I’m not sure he even knows,” said one of his closest advisers, who declined to be identified because of the subject matter.

Mayweather has claimed on at least three other occasions that he was retiring.

Mayweather said the retirement talk is real this time. “I gave my word already. Once I gave my word to my children, it’s the end. It came to an end,” Mayweather said. “This is a great event. What better way to go out than with a bang?”

At Mayweather’s media day this month, an associate was hurrying to move $200,000 of the boxer’s money to fund a vacation for Mayweather and friends in the Middle East.

Mayweather also is invested in his Mayweather Promotions company that has 45 fighters, including lightweight champion Gervonta Davis and former super-middleweight champion Badou Jack (both on Saturday’s undercard), along with real estate in New York, Miami and Los Angeles.

“He’s going to finally, finally, have a chance to put his illustrious boxing career behind him and move on to the next phase of his life and business,” said Leonard Ellerbe, chief executive of Mayweather Promotions.