Will we see another Pacquiao-Mayweather sighting at tonight’s Lakers game?

By Boxing News - 01/29/2015 - Comments

pac6By Sizzle JKD: Here’s the thing, the Los Angeles Lakers host the Chicago Bulls tonight at Staples Center in Los Angeles, a game which will be nationally televised on TNT. How is this relevant, you ask?

The last three weeks, Manny Pacquiao has been in a rapid-fire tour that saw him promote his docu-film “Manny” in Hollywood and New York, travel to England to have dinner with Prince Harry, followed by a trip to Miami to judge the Miss Universe pageant and have two not-so-impromptu (in this author’s opinion) meetings with undefeated pound-for-pound champ Floyd Mayweather Jr.

Wednesday morning, Pacquiao arrived back in Los Angeles where he will stay for a couple days and on Tuesday he will travel to Washington D.C. to cap off his personal “worldwide” tour before returning to the Philippines on February 6, according to Philboxing.com

If you recall, Pacquiao adviser Michael Koncz said Tuesday that Pacquiao and Mayweather’s unplanned meeting at the Miami Heat game was purely coincidental because Pacquiao already had a flight booked for New York but was cancelled due to the heavy snowstorms in the eastern part of the United States. Therefore they decided to stay another night in Miami and watch the game, where lo and behold Mayweather shows up. Coincidental? You be the judge.

Koncz also said they were planning to head back to Los Angeles the following day, and Pacquiao would travel directly to the Philippines shortly thereafter. Not once did Koncz mention Pacquiao returning to the east coast, however it has been confirmed by sources that Pacquiao is indeed going to the nation’s capital next Tuesday and that Pacquiao would be in Los Angeles for a few more days. Hmm…I wonder why.

If you put the pieces of the puzzle together and read between the lines, you would realize that a planned “press tour” was taking place without the camps formally announcing one. Which means Pacquiao touring the United States is an informal event, without the organized media following that usually comes with a planned press tours, full with Q-and-A sessions with both fighters.

The one Mayweather and Pacquiao are doing is cost-free and that’s the key to this whole thing from the promoter’s perspective because there wouldn’t be enough time to set everything up considering the magnitude of this fight and the current timetable. It would simply be a very expensive logistical nightmare.

Meanwhile, the last month has seen Mayweather attend numerous NBA games in Los Angeles and has planned a trip to Australia to conduct some type of promotion.

What the promotion is we don’t know but it’s becoming more and more obvious that both Pacquaio and Mayweather are making stops around the county and around the world in order to build even more media coverage, get in front of the camera, and promote themselves. Most importantly, the press gobbles it all up and the resulting media frenzy has pretty much justified how Mayweather and Pacquiao simply being “in the news” has promoted itself.

Whatever hype Mayweather’s planned trip to Australia is for, one can only guess. But it’s been my feeling for weeks that all of this has been masterfully planned by both camps since December in order to promote and market the fight with the lowest possible overhead.

“Free” promotions, if you will, since no media is needed to be assembled to follow both fighters’ camps to conduct a comprehensive “worldwide” tour of sorts, saving both promotional companies millions of dollars in the process.

As Koncz said on Wednesday, it is not necessary for both Pacquiao and Mayweather to have a multi-city press tour because everyone already knows who they are. One or two stops, perhaps in Los Angeles and New York, sometime in late February is all that is needed. This makes complete sense, both logistically and financially.

Now going back to tonight’s Lakers game versus the Bulls in Los Angeles, it wouldn’t be out of the realm of possibility if we saw both Pacquiao and Mayweather sitting court side once again in front of a nationally televised audience to continue their not-so-impromptu press tour.

If we don’t see Pacquiao and Mayweather together at the game, then maybe one time was enough. But we do know that Manny will be in Los Angeles today and tomorrow and Floyd is probably not too far away.

And if we see both fighters share pleasantries at mid court yet again, I’m just going to sit back, relax, and enjoy the show, pour me a glass of Hennessy while watching the perfectly scripted process unfold.

Stay tuned.



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