Laila Ali on Floyd Mayweather Jr.: 'I see a broken person'

Laila Ali had some interesting things to say about Floyd Mayweather, saying that the fighter needs someone to "guide him."

By Sean Wagner-McGough

May 1, 2015 at 9:23 am ET • 1 min read

Laila Ali, the daughter of Muhammad Ali, understands why Floyd Mayweather Jr. thinks he's a better boxer than her father. She gets it. Appearing on CBS Sports Network's "We Need To Talk," Laila Ali said, "I believe as a fighter and a champion, especially someone at [Mayweather's] level, he should feel that way about himself.

"That doesn't make it true."

Ali went on to say that, first of all, she doesn't agree that Mayweather is better than her father as a boxer. But it's more than that.

"I think about the man my father is outside the ring," Ali said.

Ali knows the Mayweather family. She's been in the gym with Floyd and his uncle, Roger Mayweather. Floyd's father, Mayweather Sr., trained Ali in her fighting days.

"I see a little boy even though he's a grown man," Ali said of Mayweather Jr. "I see a broken person. I know when you have money and you have power and you have all these yes people around you, sometimes you don't have that person to really pull you aside and give it to you straight.

"So every once in awhile, I'm just like, 'You know what? I need to reach out to Floyd and I need to have a conversation with him.' Because I don't hate him. I dislike the way that he acts. I dislike the way that he treats people. And obviously, I'm definitely not down with this beating up on women because that's very cowardly. But ... he needs somebody to reach out to him and guide him."

The Ali-Mayweather conflict all started when Mayweather said he was better than both Sugar Ray Robinson and Muhammad Ali. Then George Foreman further escalated the situation by saying he also thought Mayweather was a better fighter than Ali. Mike Tyson, on the other hand, didn't seem very pleased with Mayweather.

Ali himself has mainly stayed quiet on the issue, except when he posted the following picture on Twitter, along with a not so subtle caption.