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It's not easy to leave Floyd Mayweather Jr. speechless.

But there the five-division champion was -- a few feet from the action in a ringside seat -- as his promotional company's prized property, Badou Jack, was separated from both his consciousness and his unbeaten record by a Derek Edwards right hand.

The loss derailed an elimination bout for a super middleweight title shot for Jack and became a popular candidate for 2014's Upset of the Year. And it wasn't hard to find fans and media members quickly exiting the Swedish prospect's bandwagon in the aftermath.

Mayweather, though, told CBS Sports that he never flinched.

"A true champion can bounce back from a loss," the retired fighter, now full-time president of Mayweather Promotions, said. "As long as you stay focused and surround yourself with a good team, it all works out. I told him to keep his head up, stay focused and to trust that he would bounce back and become champion."

Just 420 days later, the boss' conviction was legitimized.

Jack seized a 168-pound title belt with a surprise of his own -- dethroning unbeaten WBC champ Anthony Dirrell - and has since defended twice while working his way back into the spotlight, where he'll meet IBF claimant James DeGale in a Saturday night unification bout in Brooklyn.

DeGale, ironically, is the opponent Jack was set to meet in the scuttled elimination bout three years ago, and Mayweather claims it's his client's drive that allowed him to regain his career footing.

"He carries himself like a professional at all times. He has very unique skills and he has a great work ethic," Mayweather said. "He's definitely a more complete fighter. Badou is very comfortable now. Everything in his life is going the way it's supposed to go. He's putting in the hard work and has dedicated himself to his craft.

"I'm glad that Badou is the face of Mayweather Promotions."

Jack and DeGale will headline a busy Saturday fight night on Showtime's cable properties.

The network begins with a 7 p.m. card on its Extreme channel that will include welterweights Thomas Dulorme and Brian Jones, middleweights Ievgen Khytrov and Immanuwel Aleem, and a women's junior featherweight title bout between Amanda Serrano and Yazmin Rivas.

The 9:30 p.m. Showtime show includes a 130-pound title match between IBF champ Jose Pedraza and another Mayweather prospect, Gervonta Davis, before the super middleweight bout that'll unify two titles, result in the awarding of the Ring Magazine belt and allow its winner to stake a claim to succeed Andre Ward as the division's top commodity.

Not surprisingly, Mayweather likes his man, though he's been cast as the underdog.

A $275 wager on DeGale is required to recoup $100 at the Bovada online sportsbook, while a $100 outlay on Jack would return a $215 windfall in the event of an upset.

"All he has to go is out there, stay focused and listen to his corner," Mayweather said. "I'm very confident that Badou will become unified champion."

Jack, now 33 years old and possessing a 20-1-2 record with 12 KOs, is no less optimistic.

"Obviously, (DeGale has) done something right to become Olympic gold medalist and become a professional world champion," he told CBS Sports. "I know he's very talented. He moves well. He's a very athletic guy. But we've got a game plan and I'm not worried about him.

"It's a unification fight. Two champions fighting each other and for the Ring Magazine title. So, yeah, it's the biggest fight. But that doesn't mean it's going to be the toughest fight."

A win would likely mean a swan song at 168 pounds for Jack, who stands 6-foot-1 and boasts a 73-inch reach, and claims the struggle to make the required weight is becoming too difficult. He said he's swelled to as much as 195 pounds between fights, and enlisted the help of famed nutritionist Mackie Shilstone to make sure this Friday night's weigh-in is free of drama.

The aforementioned Ward rose from super middleweight to claim a handful of light heavyweight belts with a defeat of Sergey Kovalev in November. He's an inch shorter and would have a two-inch reach disadvantage against Jack, while the other most highly-regarded claimant at 175 -- Adonis Stevenson -- is another alumnus of the 168-pound ranks and stands just 5-foot-11, though his reach is 77 inches.

"We've already proved that me and (DeGale) are the two best guys (at 168) and now we're going to see who's the No. 1," Jack said. "There's really nobody that's a big name or a big-money fight or somebody that's a top guy after that. So I think it's time to move up to the next weight class. That's where all the big names and the big-money fights are. Absolutely.

"I've got a tough fight ahead of me and it's one fight at a time, but after that we go to 175. The future is definitely at 175."