By Chris Williams: Alex Ariza, the mastermind behind the bulking up of Manny Pacquiao during his best years, says that Floyd Mayweather Jr absolutely wants the fight with Pacquiao in May and that he’d not dodging the fight. Mayweather wants to face the Filipino star and get him out of the way once and for all.
Pacquiao’s promoter Bob Arum voiced frustration earlier today in complaining that Mayweather hasn’t signed the contract for the fight even though Pacquiao supposedly has agreed to everything that Mayweather has asked for.
Obviously, this is a one-sided report from Arum because I’m sure Mayweather would have something to say about this if he were the one giving the interview and not Arum.
“I know that Floyd wants this fight with Manny very, very, very badly. He wants this fight more than ever right now,” Ariza said to Fighthype.com. “I don’t think I’ve ever heard him talk about wanting to fight anybody this much. He usually doesn’t care who he fights. It could be this guy or that guy, but he really wants to fight Manny,” Ariza said.
That’s it then. Mayweather wants the fight, and he’s not ducking or dodging the 36-year-old Pacquiao. Why would he? Pacquiao has looked nothing special since 2012 in his fights against Tim Bradley, Chris Algieri, Brandon Rios and Juan Manuel Marquez. He’s not moving like he used to, and he only does well when his opponents are stupid enough to just stand there so he can throw dozens of punches.
None of the guys that Pacquiao has fought since being knocked cold by Marquez has used any movement against him, which is kind of strange. Even if Chris Algieri seemed to lose his sense completely when he fought Pacquiao last November.
Instead of doing the things that got him the fight, Algieri tried to stand and trade with Pacquiao, and the outcome was predictable with Algieri, a weak puncher, being outgunned by him.
Mayweather wants the fight with Pacquiao, but he doesn’t want to just go belly up in the negotiations and give them the crown jewels when he feels that might not deserve it. Mayweather will sign the contract when he sees the numbers that he’s looking for. The purse split that’s been floated recently, 60-40, would obviously be a number that is way too kind for the fight to go ahead.
With Pacquiao’s sinking pay-per-view numbers and his loss to Marquez and his less than impressive opposition, he arguably doesn’t deserve better than a 70-30 split in my view. If Mayweather isn’t signing the contract now then perhaps Arum needs to come back to the 70-30 number and then he might see Mayweather’s signing nature on the contract. Anything more than that would be a case of Mayweather giving Pacquiao a retirement sendoff, and I’m not sure that Mayweather wants to do that.
Pacquiao is the only guy left that Mayweather needs to get out of the way before he retires, but if he’s not going to be met halfway then how can you expect him to sign the contract? Arum and Pacquiao need to come up with the 70-30 split agreement and then I can see the fight get done.
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