The former CEO of Floyd Mayweather Jr’s Mayweather Music and the founding president of The Mayweather FoundationTasha Robinson-White recently released a book, “Right Hand to the Champ” chronicling her time working for the boxing champ. Tasha worked from 1998-2009 starting out as Floyd’s assistant before becoming the President of The Floyd Mayweather Jr. Foundation .
In part one of our conversation, we covered Floyd’s transition from “Pretty Boy Floyd” to “Money Mayweather,” Floyd’s harem of women, and how he managed his finances while she was under his employment.
Jill: Let me ask you, being with Floyd’s camp seems as if it’s little misogynistic. That women are there for decoration or to be submissive. How was it to work in that sort of environment?
Tasha: Well, for the record, I stopped working for Floyd in 2009, so before all the extra girls that you see, there were not a lot of women around at the time. I was the only female that actually worked with Floyd early on, from 1998 to 2009. I eventually got an assistant I think in 2007-2008, he actually got an assistant around 2007-2008 and there was me, and a lot of times his sisters would play roles in helping out and what not, but the team was Leonard Ellerbe, Tasha Robinson White and Floyd Mayweather, and then of course he had his boxing publicist Kelly Swanson and other people like that. He had girlfriends that hung out, but the girls that hang out with him now are pretty much his employees, so he says, that’s how it puts it, those are his employees.
Jill: Strippers?
Tasha: I don’t know where they come from, but women of all walks of life actually work with him, so I don’t put myself on that level.
Jill: So you weren’t exposed to that?
Tasha: I’ve seen the strippers, I’ve seen what he brought around. He coordinated events and wanted events done, and certain women would come you knew they were strippers or what not but that wasn’t me, I come from a whole different background… He was a product and what came with his product came with his product, but when I was working with him, that wasn’t the scene.
Jill: That wasn’t the scene, so he adapted the women and all the excess as part of his image. Just to grow his legend?
Tasha: Yes. He’s always liked a pretty face, what man doesn’t? However, when he morphed into “Money Mayweather” from Pretty Boy Floyd, that became a character. Women , money, cars and all the extra stuff, that just became his character, because the media and his fans really bought into it. I think it just kind of became his personality and often I’d be the one with the reality check. Sometimes that would be some of our fights because he wanted to entertain when it wasn’t the time to entertain.
Jill: Do you think that Josie (the mother of 3 of his children) is his true love? He seems to go back and forth between Josie, Melissa – his daughter Ayanna’s mother- and others?
Tasha: Melissa seems different, I don’t know. Well when I first met Floyd back in 1998, Melissa was the girlfriend, let’s get it straight, Melissa was the girlfriend. I’m not really sure, how he ended up getting with Josie in the middle of their relationship. Josie and he had a baby, then he went back to Melissa and they had a baby. Then he went back to Josie and they had two more babies. I believe Josie is more in his head when it comes to a woman. She had three children with him, she went through a lot. Melissa kind of went on and had another relationship and then they actually became friends later. I think Josie had more of his time, his intimate time, his family time.
Jill: What about his ex-fianceé Shantel Jackson?
Tasha: Shantel she was a pretty face, he liked her, he wined and dined her but she wasn’t really in the forefront. She was the fad girl for a very, very long time. Once he and Josie had a public altercation, I think shortly after that was when he announced he was engaged to Shantel. That was when she was able to come out of hiding so to speak. Because when Josie would come on the scene, Shantel had to disappear.
Jill: What do you think of all the domestic violence accusations that have surrounded him? Is that something that you are familiar with during your time with him?
Tasha: Do you really, really, really want my opinion?
Jill: Yeah, because you know him and you worked with him.
Tasha: The thing is, I never saw Floyd hit a woman, I’ve never seen him be abusive. I have seen him get upset, just like I’ve seen my own or other men that make their little insecure feelings about another man known.
I’ve seen that, but I’ve never seen him being abusive. And to be honest with you, what I think about that situation with him taking a plea bargain, I really don’t feel he took a plea bargain because he was guilty or he was confessing, I felt like he was protecting his children from having to get on a stand and get confused with everything that was going on. that’s kind of weird for me as a woman to say that, but I really like Josie and I’m not saying that against her words or whatever may have happened. I just don’t think that Floyd truly beat her up, I truly don’t believe he beat her up, I don’t. But, I’m not saying an incident didn’t happen because I believe an incident probably did take place, I just feel he was more forced to take a plea in the situation it was more about his children, I don’t feel like anyone completely informed him of what was really going on.
Jill: Do you think Floyd will end up like most athletes, going broke. Or do you think he has money for show, but he’s smart with his business?
Tasha: Once again, I haven’t worked with him since 2009. But, I can tell you from 2009 the decisions weren’t very smart, and I don’t really think at that time he had an accountant. He would invite people working with him to help him maintain that.
Today I don’t really know how he’s doing, what he’s doing, but I see him just like anybody else, making major bets on sports games and spend a lot of money in the strip clubs, buying cars and jewelry. I’d see it before anybody else, and for me to do my own mathematics from the home, hopefully he put some money aside, and hopefully he has made some investments.
Jill: You mentioned people didn’t always get paid and sometimes they were paid with “things,” is that a condition of employment with TMT, or is that because people didn’t really have regular roles?
Tasha: I think people did not have regular roles. I think that it was never really a “real payroll” established. Even when I was working there; it’s like, “come to the bank and get some money.” You knew when he got money you were going to get some money, and that’s just how it rolled, but I know with me, early on I know I always had a side job until 2005, and in 2005 I became exclusive with him as far as work.
You can find “Right Hand to the Champ: 13 Lessons that changed my life” on Amazon.
