CNN and ESPN journalists accuse boxer’s team of trying to block press credentials. ‘Confusion’ revives speculation about troubled history with women

Two top female sports reporters said on Saturday Floyd Mayweather’s support team tried to block them from attending the boxer’s highly touted fight with Manny Pacquiao in Las Vegas, prompting speculation that the alleged action was due to their reporting on his history of domestic violence against women.

Rachel Nichols of CNN and Michelle Beadle of ESPN said on Saturday that Mayweather’s team had blocked their press credentials and would not allow them into the arena for the Saturday night fight.

“No fight for me or [Beadle]. Mayweather’s team told my producer the camp was blocking my credential,” Nichols tweeted.

“I, along with [Nichols], have been banned from the MGM Grand Arena for the fight tonight by the Mayweather camp,” Beadle tweeted.

The public relations firm that represents Mayweather denied that either reporter had been banned, however, owner Kelly Swanson tweeting that both were “already credentialed” and that Beadle “isn’t even on the press list”.

Beadle later confirmed that HBO was able to re-approve her credential late Friday night, but she had gone home “after hearing my credential was pulled” – and by which point the confusion over access provoked speculation that Mayweather had tried to prohibit reporters who have highlighted the many accusations against him.

The public spat also revived discussion about Mayweather’s past in the hours before his most anticipated fight in years.

In September 2014, Nichols interviewed Mayweather in the same week that video emerged of the football player Ray Rice punching his then fiancee. Nichols grilled Mayweather about accusations from five different women that he beat them, including in front of his own children.

“Everything has been allegations. Nothing has been proven. So that’s life,” Mayweather said, when pressed about 2011 charges that he battered and tried to break the arm of an ex-girlfriend, Josie Harris. “Once again, no pictures, just hearsay and allegations.”

Mayweather pleaded guilty to domestic battery in a deal that spared him felony charges. He served two months of a three-month sentence.

Those allegations came in part from Mayweather’s son Zion, who was nine years old when the incident leading to the charges occurred. He told police: “He was punching her and kicking her. He was punching her in the head and he was stomping on her shoulder.”

Zion’s brother Koraun, then 10, later wrote to police that he fled from the scene to seek help. Police wrote in their report into the incident that Mayweather threatened violence on his sons if they called police, and also threatened to kill and pour acid on Harris. She was later treated for a “large contusion on the right side of her forehead and chin” at a hospital, the police report said.

“Everybody’s entitled to their on opinion,” Mayweather told Nichols last year. “You know, when it’s all said and done, only God can judge me.”



In 2014, Beadle apologized for not better reporting Mayweather’s past, saying she “was not aware of just how horrible his record” is.

In 2001, an ex-girlfriend sued Mayweather for a “brutal and unprovoked attack”. After another accusation five months later, he eventually pleaded guilty to two misdemeanor charges of domestic battery against her. She said he punched her in the neck at the mall in front of a friend and their daughter. Mayweather served two days of house arrest and 48 hours of community service.

On Saturday, former boxer and current promoter Oscar De La Hoya tweeted that the ban on Beadle and Nichols was a “classless move”. Journalists leapt to decry it and praise the reporters. ESPN anchor Randy Scott tweeted that the ban proved Mayweather, “his camp, and his production team are cowards”.

The Nevada boxing commission did not suspend Mayweather after he pleaded guilty to charges in 2011, in contrast to the NFL’s response to the charges against Rice last year. The NFL initially suspended Rice for two games, and then, when more video became public of the assault, suspended him indefinitely. Rice later won an appeal against his suspension.

In September, Mayweather defended Rice and criticized the NFL, saying: “I think there’s a lot worse things that go on in other people’s households, also. It’s just not caught on video.”