PRESS TOUR INSIDER REPORT: DAY 3

HBO.com tags along on Floyd and Oscar's eight-city road show | February 21, 2007. Philadelphia, PA & Washington DC.

Photos by Rob DeLorenzo/Golden Boy

Did we call it or did we call it? No one on the tour was surprised by the sudden warm weather on the East coast yesterday. It was clear by the red in Oscar's face at the end of the day that there was enough heat there to start a fire.

The fighters traveled in style the old fashioned way -- first class Amtrak from New York to Philly. Someone mentioned that this was like calling shotgun in a Ford Taurus.

At the press conference, held in Bernard Hopkins' neighborhood on the Campus of Temple U, even the Mayor of Philadelphia was clamoring for a pair of tickets to the event. At the time of this writing, we don’t think His Honor had secured seats.

Then it was back on board for another train ride, during which Mayweather decided to try his moves with one of the attendants, telling her he was a famous "performer" -- on the bachelorette party circuit. Unfazed, she told a speechless Pretty Boy that since she was on the clock, she would "check out his act" at a later date.

The day wrapped up in Washington DC at the cavernous Union Station, where hundreds of fans came out to cheer on the fighters. An informal assessment of audience volume scored the crowd more in favor of Oscar than Floyd. This seemed to burn Floyd, who began to repeat his New York performance.

As Oscar rose to speak, Floyd riled the crowd by throwing out T-shirts and starting to sign them -- while Oscar was talking. There have been few times people have seen Oscar this mad...

"He can do all the trash talking he likes, on May 5th he has to get in the ring with me and fight," De La Hoya shouted as Mayweather leaned against the podium, blocking the crowd’s view of Oscar, and signed another T-shirt.

We're off now to Chicago and Detroit on Thursday, Miami on Friday and Houston and Dallas on Monday. No word yet on whether Oscar will try to drown Floyd in the ocean or if Floyd will present Oscar with a big wet fish, but we expect that there are more tricks up Pretty Boy's sleeve. For his part, De La Hoya must be one of the most patient men in the game, putting up with this kind of showboating.