By Chris Williams: Top Rank promoter Bob Arum wants to put together a fight between Floyd Mayweather Jr. and his fighter WBO welterweight champion Manny Pacquiao.

That’s Arum’s number #1 choice, since it’s a fight that will make huge amounts of money for both fighters. However, there’s a good chance that the Mayweather-Pacquiao fight won’t happen because of the Olympic style blood testing that Mayweather wants both fighters to take.

If Pacquiao agrees to take the tests, then the fight can be made, but if he’s reluctant to allow the tests to be taken then Arum will be to move to his Plan B, which will probably be another Top Rank fighter Antonio Margarito (38-6, 27 KO’s). Arum has already matched Pacquiao against two of his other Top Rank fighters, Miguel Cotto and Joshua Clottey, and Pacquiao easily beat them. Now Arum could be looking to put Margarito in with Pacquiao next.

It would be a controversial move, though, because Margarito isn’t well thought of by many boxing fans after a plaster-like insert was found in his hand wraps last year before his fight against Shane Mosley in January 2009. Margarito ended up having his boxing license revoked. He still hasn’t had his license to box renewed in the United States. That, you would assume, would be Arum’s first goal in trying to match Margarito with Pacquiao, because if Margarito doesn’t get his boxing license back then Arum won’t be able to match Margarito with Pacquiao at the Cowboy Stadium, in Arlington, Texas.

That’s where Arum would like for a Margarito-Pacquiao fight to take place. The question is whether Arum would still be interested in putting Margarito in with Pacquiao if he can’t get his boxing license renewed. That would mean that a Margarito-Pacquiao fight would have to take place in Mexico rather than the United States. Given that there really aren’t a whole lot of other options available, other than putting Pacquiao in with the winner of the Miguel Cotto vs. Yuri Foreman fight right now, the Margarito-Pacquiao fight could possibly go ahead anyway even if it takes place in Mexico.

Margarito defeated Roberto Garcia by a 10 round unanimous decision last night at the Plaza Monumental, Aguascalientes, in Aguascalientes, Mexico. Margarito looked like a completely different fighter compared to the way he used to fight. Instead of throwing a massive amount of punches and pressuring Garcia all night long, Margarito moved a lot, jabbed and used in and out attacks. Although it was effective in beating Garcia, it was more than a little disappointing to see Margarito fighting so defensively.

You can still expect Pacquiao to face the winner of the Cotto-Foreman fight in the near future. That’s almost a certainty. As for Margarito, he didn’t look nearly good enough last night to compete with the likes Pacquiao. He seems to have put on more muscle on his arms and isn’t able to throw massive amounts of punches like he used to. A fight with Margarito and Pacquiao, besides being a disappointing replacement for a Mayweather-Pacquiao fight, would likely be a hopeless mismatch with Pacquiao destroying Margarito.

But Arum doesn’t have any other welterweights to put Pacquiao in that are well known enough. He had hoped to put Pacquiao with Top Rank fighter Edwin Valero, but he recently committed suicide. Welterweight contender Jesus Soto-Karass isn’t at a high level to be put in with Pacquiao. There are really no other options unless Arum wants to match Pacquiao with middleweight prospect/contender Matt Korobov. That’s obviously not going to happen, so it’s Margarito, then the winner of Cotto-Foreman for Pacquiao. I think eventually even the loser of the Cotto-Foreman fight will end up fighting Pacquiao.