By Chris Williams: Manny Pacquiao and Juan Manuel Marquez will start their three-city press tour tomorrow [Monday], beginning in Beverly Hills, California. They will also travel to New York and Mexico City. The two fighters are hyping their December 8th fight at the MGM Grand in Las Vegas, Nevada. It’s unfortunate that his old match-up was put together by Bob Arum because these guys are getting old. Marquez is now 39, while Pacquiao is an old 33.

The fight will be broadcast on HBO with a likely cost in the neighborhood of $49.99 on pay per view. Bob Arum, Pacquiao’s promoter, still hasn’t ironed out who exactly will be fighting on the undercard but one would hope that it has some talented fighters if boxing fans are going to be asked to pay $50 to see Pacquiao and Marquez fight for the fourth time. When you get old fight match-ups like this, it really should be discounted steeply because it’s been too times already. That’s why I feel that Arum should bend over backwards to make sure that the undercard is a good one.

Frankly, I was badly disappointed with Arum’s undercard for the Julio Chavez Jr. vs. Sergio Martinez PPV card last Saturday in Las Vegas. There was only one good fight on the entire card. No, I take that back. There were zero good fights on the card, because the main event between Chavez Jr. and Martinez turned out to be a mostly dull mismatch with Martinez easily beating Chavez Jr.

If boxing fans are going to be paying a ton of money to see Pacquiao and Marquez fight again, then I hope Arum packs the undercard with some talent to make it more worthwhile for the boxing fans that are having to pay their hard earned money.

Marquez got selected because he can bring in the Hispanic fans to purchase the fight in high numbers on PPV. He also brings in the fans to Las Vegas, as we saw last November when the MGM Grand crowd erupted in a loud sustained chorus of boos after the judges decision was announced giving Pacquiao a controversial 12 round decision win over Marquez. This time Marquez doesn’t want to leave it up to the judges. He plans on knocking Pacquiao out to make sure he gets the win.

It’s going to be interesting to see how strong Martinez gets for this fight. His strength trainer worked wonders with him last November in turning Marquez into a powerful punching machine that had Pacquiao looking weak in comparison.