Roach: Provodnikov doesn’t want to fight Pacquiao, but he has to for his family

By Chris Williams: Trainer Freddie Roach is clear that he won’t be working his fighter WBO light welterweight champion Ruslan Provodnikov’s corner if he faces Manny Pacquiao later this year on November 22nd in Macao, China. Roach says he’ll definitely be with the 35-year-old Filipino star. It’s obvious move by Roach because Pacquiao is paying him big, big cash for each fight that Roach works in his corner.

Provodnikov, 30, has a very real chance of winding up as Pacquiao’s opponent in November unless Bob Arum of Top Rank can get 40-year-old Juan Manuel Marquez to back off his request of a 50-50 purse split for the fight. Marquez wants to make the same kind of money that Pacquiao is getting because Marquez will bring in a lot of Mexican fans to purchase the fight on pay-per-view.

Roach says that Provodnikov doesn’t want to fight Pacquiao, but he’ll do it because he needs to make money.

“Yeah, Manny is my guy, we’ve been together for a long, long time,” Roach said. “We always hoped the Mayweather [fight] would happen. I’m glad him [Pacquiao] and Cotto have grown out of each other’s weight classes, so that’s not going to happen. Ruslan doesn’t want to do it, but he knows he has to do he can secure his family for the rest of his life.”

I think Provodnikov actually does want the Pacquiao fight, but Roach can keep saying that he doesn’t want to if it means something. That’s the only way Provodnikov will ever get a huge money fight because Floyd Mayweather Jr won’t fight him, and Provovodnikov doesn’t have the size, speed or boxing ability to hold down a world title for any length of time. Indeed, it wouldn’t be surprising at all if Provodnikov loses this fight this Saturday night against unbeaten fringe contender Chris Algieri (19-0, 8 KO’s) at the Barclays Center in Brooklyn, New York. If Provodnikov loses that fight, then he can forget about any idea of him getting a big money fight against Pacquiao.

Roach says he wants WBA/WBC light welterweight champion Danny Garcia to be Pacquiao’s next fight. “Bob Arum asked me who I wanted, I said ‘Danny Garcia,’ he’s going to research that, see if it’s possible, because we don’t know if Al Haymon’s involved,” Roach said to thesweetscience.com.

I wonder how Provodnikov feels about Roach telling Arum that he wants Danny Garcia to be Pacquiao’s next opponent instead of himself. I can’t imagine this would make Provodnikov feel too good that his trainer Roach is telling Arum to fight Garcia.