Jessie Vargas: Mayweather-Pacquiao fight won’t take place until September

By Boxing News - 02/02/2015 - Comments

floyd6By Chris Williams: WBA light welterweight champion Jessie Vargas, one of Bob Arum’s Top Rank stable fighters, doubts that the Floyd Mayweather Jr vs. Manny Pacquiao fight will take place on May 2nd like the boxing fans want it to. At this point Vargas (26-0, 9 KO) thinks it’s too close to May for the fight to come off.

Instead, he thinks the fight will take place in September. Presumably all the issues that are slowing the fight negotiations down right now will have been taken care of by September so that the Mayweather-Pacquiao fight can happen without any hiccups like the ones that it’s experiencing now.

Vargas is hoping he’ll be able to get the fight in place of Mayweather to face Pacquiao. He feels a fight against Pacquiao will be just what his career needs to take him to the next level.

“I think it’s a very interesting fight. It might happen in September to give it time. It seems like it’s too close for that May fight to come,” Vargas said via Hustleboss. “I still want it [Pacquiao fight]. I fought three southpaws in a row; there’s a reason behind it. I’m well-prepared for any southpaw now.”

It’s imperative that the Mayweather-Pacquiao fight negotiations finish up within the next couple of weeks in order for the marketing of the fight to start. If they want to market the fight in the right way to reach the most about of boxing fans then they need to start almost right away. That means we’re probably talking about a world tour and huge tour of the United States. Yes, it’ll be a pretty exhausting affair, but they should be able to get it out of the way within 3 weeks. The fighters can then start their training in March for the fight.

Vargas’ name has been mentioned frequently as Pacquiao’s real plan-B option if the Mayweather fight doesn’t take place. While a lot has been said in the boxing world about Amir Khan being the backup plan for Pacquiao, it’s not a fight that has much of any chance of taking place due to Khan being managed by Al Haymon.

Arum and Haymon don’t work together on fights, so it’s extremely doubtful that Khan will be able to get the Pacquiao fight. Vargas makes sense for Pacquiao because Arum tends to keep his fights in house in a club-like way and he likes to match many of his guys together in repeated rematches rather than putting them in with other fighters from different promoters.

If Arum matches Pacquiao up with Vargas on May 30th, then the fight could increase the popularity of the 25-year-old Vargas, even if he loses the fight. Look at Brandon Rios. After his one-sided loss to Pacquiao in 2013, Rios is now well-known with casual boxing fans and getting close to $1 million per fight to face guys like Diego Chaves and Mike Alvarado, neither of which are huge stars. If Arum can put Pacquiao in with Vargas then there’s a strong possibility that Vargas will be soon fighting for good money even if he doesn’t face well-known guys at 140.



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