Mikaela Mayer Would Have Had To ‘Suck it Up’ If Paint Was Thrown on Her

Mayer recently sat down with undisputed female minimumweight champion Seniesa Estrada for Top Rank’s ‘The Good Exchange.’ In conversation, Estrada joked about Mayer’s “alleged” involvement in the paint incident and asked her if the debacle taught her anything about the people around her.

“Having a good team around you is so important,” Mayer responded. “And I think Sandy really suffered because it wasn’t the paint getting thrown at her; it was the way her whole team reacted. If that would have happened to me, Coach Al would be like, ‘Hey, suck it up, let’s go, we got a job to do.’”

On the day of their first fight, as she was leaving for the venue at Madison Square Garden, she was hit by a tin of paint at her hotel. And barely two days after the fight, she demanded an immediate rematch in light of the incident.

Estrada nodded in agreement with Mayer’s words and mentioned that she and many other fighters had gone through mental and emotional turmoil on the way to the arena. And as a fighter, one should always be mentally prepared and hold it together.

“Especially if you’re in the best shape you’re in, you have a good game plan, you should be able to go in there and keep it all together,” she said.

“Sandy Has A Pretty Weak Mentality”

Ryan’s reaction to the incident certainly did not go well with Mayer. Neither have the accusations of her alleged involvement in the incident. Talking to Sky Sports, Mayer shared her thoughts on the infamous photograph of Ryan with the red paint dripping down her side and delved into why she thinks she isn’t mentally strong as a fighter.

“I think Sandy has a pretty weak mentality. I think she overthinks a lot; she stresses out a lot,” she said. “The way she reacted to the paint thing and taking a photo shoot and all that, I can tell that she’s easily flustered. That’s not good. At the end of the day, this sport is all mental, so you’ve got to have your head right.”