Raucous Mayweather-McGregor tour shows everyone's in on the act

TORONTO - Toronto has always been a professional wrestling town.

Based on the reaction that Floyd Mayweather and Conor McGregor received on the second stop of their whirlwind promotional tour Wednesday, you'd think the Ultimate Warrior had come back to life and pinned Hulk Hogan all over again. And just like that famed WrestleMania show at the stadium once known as SkyDome, you got the feeling the crowd was eager to play along with the Mayweather-McGregor show.

This time, the venue was the Budweiser Stage, an appropriate name given the sold-out crowd of 16,000-plus did everything in their power to be as involved as the two fighters trading verbal shots in front of them.

Make no mistake about it - the pundits who once swore off Mayweather-McGregor as a modern freak show are in the minority now. The rest have accepted that the Aug. 26 bout could be one of the greatest spectacles in sports history, and are happy to be along for the ride.

How else to explain the overwhelming support for McGregor's opening verbal salvo, which mixed the best of "Stone Cold" Steve Austin's anti-authority persona - McGregor gleefully cussed out Showtime exec Steven Espinoza and Team Mayweather's Leonard Ellerbe - with Rocky III's Clubber Lang and "The Wolf of Wall Street" himself, Jordan Belfort.

The speech was clearly rehearsed, and Team Mayweather looked delighted to be on the receiving end of the tongue lashing. Why wouldn't they be? Everyone with a hand in this fight is going to walk out with their pockets overflowing with cash.

So, it's best for them to just play along and make it easy for fans to embrace the layers of conflict evident in this match: Boxing vs. MMA. Old school vs. new school. USA vs. Ireland. The quality of the actual fight is of no consequence; the show has already begun, and the part that's free might be the best.

Mayweather himself has no choice but to accept that even though he's the supposed A-side of this pairing, he's also the villain, whether in Los Angeles, Brooklyn, Toronto, or London. So far his following has been sparse at these events, and even his loyalists have been sheepish in responding with "Dedication!" to his trademark call of "Hard Work!"

And with representatives from WorldStarHipHop in the house, you couldn't blame Mayweather fans for wanting to avoid a confrontation with McGregor zealots that would surely go viral.

But it's that interaction, that remote hint of danger, the understanding that the proverbial circus is in town - all of that factors into why this fight is such a delightfully guilty pleasure. How can something so wrong feel so right?

To bring back the professional wrestling comparison, the fact is we're all adults here. We know that regardless of who has their hand raised, and what insults are hurled, both men are coming out as major winners. A nine-figure payday will go a long way toward helping the loser lick his wounds.

"(McGregor) has the ability that only the best WWE wrestlers have, the ability to say something outrageous with absolute confidence," Espinoza said. "And that's something - The Rock had it, some of the biggest stars in the WWE had it. Not many people have it. Conor and Floyd both have it."

While that comment was made at a pre-show scrum before McGregor called him a "f--king weasel" on stage, it sounded like Espinoza is thrilled with the entire package "The Notorious" brings to the table.

Him, and everyone else who's accepted the reality of this once impossible matchup that's become a surreal slice of entertainment.

(Photos courtesy: Action Images)