(Photo credit: Idris Erba/Mayweather Promotions) By Cameron Gillon: I’m a young boxing fan, but I study the sport every day with great detail. Lately I’ve seen a lot of articles on here being based around the long awaited mega fight of this generation between the two best welterweight fighters in the world right now in Floyd Mayweather Jr and Manny Pacquiao.
Now this fight was really bought up when Mayweather came back from retirement in 2009, he had his first fight back against a fighter Pacquiao knows better than anyone in Juan Manual Marquez. Marquez was moving up two divisions to get this fight but was arguably in the peek of his career when they fought and Mayweather defeated Marquez in a 12 round unanimous decision. After that fight everyone in the boxing world firmly believed we was finally going to see the fight the world awaited and still does in 2010.
Fight negotiations between the two fighters and there camps in late 2009. In December it was reported that Pacquiao had signed a deal to fight Mayweather on March 13th 2010. Shortly after though Pacquiao denied these rumors and said he had never signed anything to the fight. A week later a eight page letter was sent to Golden Boy from a representative of Pacquiao to who wanted a 50/50 split for the fight between both fighters for the fight. The contract also stated that both fighters would have random drug testing in Olympic style testing. A Mayweather/Pacquiao bout at that time was expected to be the largest-grossing fight in history, in which total revenues could reach 300 million. Experts predicted the fight would sell between 2.5 million and 3 million pay-per-views in the U.S
Now the issue that came up in this time of the deal was when Pacquiao wanted a window for when the testing would stop. Promoter Bob Arum said it was down to Pacquiao being unsure about needles and he feels weakened when he gets blood taken from him. This sadly ended the fight and was called off. Later on Arum offered Floyd Mayweather a 24 hour take it or leave it offer to get the fight back on and accept team Pacquiao’s drug testing requests.
On January 7, 2010, both of the camps went into mediation to try and get the fight back on but Arum declared that the fight was officially off after Mayweather refused to agree to a 24-day cut-off date. Mayweather revealed that he offered a 14-day cut-off date to Team Pacquiao, but it was rejected. Mayweather Promotions CEO Leonard Ellerbe declared on January 18, 2010, that random blood and urine testing will be implemented in all of Mayweather’s future fights, regardless of the opponent which ended up to be Shane Mosley and Pacquiao went on to face Joshua Clottey in fights both Mayweather and Pacquiao came out with a win.
On January 20, 2012, that Mayweather called Pacquiao on the telephone and spoke directly with him about once again getting the fight on for a big summer fight. During that call Pacquiao asked Mayweather for a 50/50 split to which Mayweather declined, but Mayweather told Pacquiao he can make more money during the fight against him than he has in his entire career.
Mayweather offered him $40 million but said all the PPV revenue share would go to him. Now after the phone call when Pacquiao was asked about this, he said he refused because he wanted a 55/45 split in his favor to which he had no chance of getting from Mayweather. The fight never happened and in the summer of 2012. Pacquiao lost a controversial split decision loss to Timothy Bradley, which ended the nine year unbeaten run he took everyone on and lost his WBO world title in the process. This signaled that the fight was never going to happen with Mayweather. Pacquiao then went on to face Juan Manual Marquez in a 4th fight to which he was brutally knocked out and a possible retirement could be happening for him after back to back losses. A few months after that loss, Pacquiao suggested that the fight can still happen and he doesn’t have a problem with any of the drug testing, and said he will do whatever Mayweather wants to get the fight. This is odd as before he got beat by Bradley and Marquez he was asking for all gains. He wanted a bigger payday and refused any demands from Floyd Mayweather, yet now he has had a few losses, he will do anything to get the fight.
Manny has slowly been on the decline fight by fight and hasn’t impressed in recent years. He hasn’t looked like the fighter he was for those years he dismantled all the elite fighters like Ricky Hatton, Oscar De La Hoya, Miguel Cotto, Antonio Margarito, were talking the best fighters around at that time, and since then he has looked poor against Brandon Rios and Bradley.
Mayweather has recently stated that whilst Bob Arum is still promoting Manny Pacquiao that he will never fight him. This is understandable considering the problems Mayweather has had with Arum in the past when he was promoted by him. Pacquiao was coming to the end of his Top Rank contract in early 2014 when this was put out to the boxing world, and many believed Manny would finally leave the promotion to get the big mega fight he has been asking for. But yet again Manny avoids taking the fight and re-signs the contract with Top Rank until 2017, which effectively ends any chance of the fight happening as Mayweather has three fights left on his Showtime/CBS contract at that stage, and one was done with Marcos Maidana in May. If Manny wanted the fight that bad then why did he re-sign with Top Rank?
The last few weeks the subject has been re-surfaced in the build up to both of there next fights. Mayweather has a rematch with the heavy hitter Marcos Maidana next weekend. Maidana pushed Mayweather to the limit in there last fight to which many believed Maidana won. I personally don’t and I called the fight to Mayweather. Manny Pacquiao has a fight against Chris Algieri, who will only be known to the hardcore fans right now. Algieri made himself known by beating Ruslan Provodnikov last June to win the WBO light welterweight title to get the fight with Manny.
Manny Pacquiao, his trainer Freddie Roach and promoter Bob Arum have been wrongly over-shadowing this fight with consistent talk of a fight between Pacquiao and Mayweather for 2015. None of them have mentioned anything about the fight with Algieri, which is strange as they have spent all this money on a 27 thousand press tour yet they haven’t promoted the fight? They are just hyping up the fight people want to see so they can bring in more buyers to watch this fight to see if Pacquiao can get past this test so he can fight Mayweather next year. Fans aren’t stupid yet Arum keeps trying to suck fans in with this rubbish and whats worse is they know this fight could well be the lowest numbers Pacquiao has bought in for a very long time. His numbers have declined over the years after back to back losses in 2012 and you can’t see them improving unless he faces a fighter from another promotion. But with the cold war going on, it’s unlikely and we will carry on seeing the usual Pacquiao/Marquez 5, Pacquiao/Bradley 3 or fights against Brandon Rios, Algieri, Provodnikov again.It’s not what we want to see.
Of course we want to see the big mega fight between the two best of this generation, yet Pacquiao and his camp always bring the subject up. But why does Mayweather get the most blame for it not happening? It seems to me he has offered Manny plenty of chances for the fight with great gains. In my opinion, Manny back then knew he was better than Mayweather or he thought he was in himself and believed he was the A-side in the fight. Now he that has had a few losses, he knows hes blown his chances to get the fight and will desperately do anything to get it.
Pacquiao has gone to the unusual trash talking to boxing fans know that’s not his style by saying he is scared of losing unbeaten record, and knows he’s the biggest threat to his throne. Maybe so, however, we all know this talk will come to nothing in the end as after the Algieri fight in November this will be bought up in the press conference post to the fight and he will likely answer ‘It’s up to my promoter Bob Arum’ to which the fight won’t happen and Mayweather who hasn’t even bought up the subject will be the one to get the blame once again.
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