By Chris Williams: If Juan Manuel Marquez was hoping to get some crazy money for his 5th fight against Manny Pacquiao, he may need to listen to what Pacquiao’s adviser Michael Koncz is saying because he’s talking about Marquez getting what they feel he’s worth.

“We won’t pay him more than what we think he deserves to be paid,” Koncz said.

That can mean any number of things, but I get the impression that Koncz means that Marquez won’t be getting a bump up in pay for the 5th fight with Pacquiao. Marquez says he wants the fight with Pacquiao for the sake of him trying to win a 5th division world title, so it’s possible that Marquez won’t mind if he’s given less than he received before or if he doesn’t get a raise from the last time he fought Pacquiao. If Marquez does care about the money then he can always walk if they give him an insulting offer.

Marquez will be the one bringing the Mexican PPV buys to a 5th fight against Pacquiao. If they don’t want to pay him what he feels he deserves, then he should move on and let Pacquiao fight Brandon Rios and Tim Bradley.

If Pacquiao doesn’t fight Marquez, his promoter Bob Arum is talking about a potential fight between him and WBO light welterweight champion Ruslan Provodnikov. The Russian fighter is plenty tough as we saw in his fights against Tim Bradley and Mike Alvarado. However, Provodnikov can be out-boxed rather easily when his opponents are focusing on just winning rounds instead of slugging with him.

Pacquiao should have little problems beating Provodnikov by a wide decision. But it’s not really a marketable fight, and Arum likely knows this. If he matches Pacquiao against Provodnikov, he will be lucky if the fight brings in 400,000 PPV buys, especially if Arum sticks the fight in Macao, China, like he’s been talking about wanting to do for Pacquiao’s next fight. An American public isn’t likely going to be paying to see Pacquiao fight Provodnikov in large numbers because that’s a fight better suited for regular HBO rather than PPV.