Arum tells Pacquiao to forget about Mayweather

By Boxing News - 10/16/2015 - Comments

Manny PacquiaoBy Chris Williams: 83-year-old Top Rank promoter Bob Arum is saying that he told his fighter Manny Pacquiao to forget all about trying to get a rematch with Floyd Mayweather Jr. because he doesn’t see it as a possibility.

Arum instead wants Pacquiao to move on with his career and face someone else for what could be his final fight in May of 2016. Arum is interested in matching Pacquiao against one of the following names that he’s picked out for him: Terence Crawford, Brandon Rios, Tim Bradley and Amir Khan.

Two of the names are Top Rank retread opponents in Rios and Bradley. Crawford is also one of Arum’s Top Rank stable fighters. Khan is the only non-Top Rank fighter among the list, and for that reason it’s quite likely that he won’t get the fight, even though he brings the most money for Pacquiao.

Why would Arum choose to have Pacquiao take a smaller money fight? It obviously helps Arum and Top Rank if he matches him against one of his own guys rather than an outsider like Khan.

“He [Pacquiao] would like to fight Mayweather, but since this is his last fight, and looking at where we are on time, I told him he needs to forget about it and move on,” Arum said in the latimes.com. “He can’t mess around and take off to go into training camp for three months if he’s in office as a senator,” Arum said.

YouTube video

Mayweather hasn’t said whether he’ll come back. He’s the type that will wait before he makes his announcement. Arum might not be doing Pacquiao any favors if he rushes to schedule what could be the final fight of his career right now. It would be smarter for Arum to wait. It would also be smarter for Arum not to match Pacquiao against Rios, Crawford or Bradley if he wants to maximize the money he can make for his final fight.

I don’t know of anyone who wants to see Pacquiao fight Rios or Bradley again. Crawford is totally unknown to the casual boxing fans in the U.S, so that’s a really, really poor fight if Arum makes it. It’s a poor fight for Pacquiao in terms of the money he’d make in comparison to a Khan fight, but I guess it would help Arum and Top Rank if Pacquiao agreed to fight Crawford.

I think Pacquiao is done with his career even if he didn’t have the senatorial election coming up in May. If Pacquiao were to stick around beyond 2016, I could see him taking losses to the likes of Crawford, and any other good fighter that Arum could think of putting him in with.

Pacquiao would have a slight advantage in extending his career because Arum would likely want to keep matching him against his Top Rank stable fighters over and over again with rematches against Rios and Bradley. Pacquiao can probably continue to beat those guys well into his 40s if he wants. But if Arum is going to match him against Crawford, then I think Pacquiao will start suffering losses.



Comments are closed.