Arum says he hopes Pacquiao doesn’t select Khan

By Boxing News - 11/26/2015 - Comments

Manny PacquiaoBy Chris Williams: In a not so surprising confession, Top Rank promoter Bob Arum says he’s hoping that his fighter Manny Pacquiao (57-6-2, 38 KOs) doesn’t select Amir Khan (31-3, 19 KOs) for his final fight of his career on April 9th in 2016. Arum points out that he doesn’t promote Khan.

There are three fighters – Terence Crawford, Tim Bradley and Khan – that Pacquiao is supposedly picking from and for his final fight, and two of them are Arum’s fighters. Crawford (27-0, 19 KOs) would seem to be Arum’s first choice for Pacquiao in my view, because Arum has been mentioning him a lot lately and Crawford hasn’t fought Pacquiao yet.

Bradley has already twice fought Pacquiao, and he’s probably about as popular as he’s ever going to be. Crawford needs a fight against Pacquiao in order to increase his popularity with the casual boxing fans, many of which likely aren’t too familiar with him.

“Would I prefer it not to be Khan? Yes, but this is Manny’s last fight,” Arum said via ESPN.com. “I have a duty to him to present him all of the options. Do I hope he doesn’t pick Khan though? Of course [because I don’t promote him], but I don’t think he will pick Khan. Khan was an option when we considered having this fight in April.”

If Pacquiao is going to look to please Arum, he probably won’t select Khan as his final fight. If I’m Khan, I don’t think I’d be waiting around for Pacquiao to make his choice for his next fight, because I think it’s very, very likely that Khan won’t be getting the fight.

When you hear Arum saying he hopes Khan doesn’t get the fight, then that’s a pretty big tip off that he won’t be getting selected. If it were another fighter like Floyd Mayweather Jr. making the selection of who he wants to fight, I don’t think he would care one bit whether Arum didn’t want him to fight Khan.

Mayweather would go with who he wants to fight, not on who Arum prefers. That’s Mayweather though. He’s one of the more assertive and intelligent fighters in the sport of boxing.

Pacquiao seems to wind up fighting a lot of the guys in Arum’s Top Rank stable, even the less than popular ones. I suspect we’ll see Pacquiao continue in this direction by him selecting Crawford for his final fight rather than Khan or another fighter outside of Arum’s Top Rank stable. If Crawford doesn’t get the fight with Pacquiao, then I see Bradley being the one that faces the Filipino fighter.

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According to ESPN, Pacquiao will get a guaranteed $20 million for his next fight no matter who he faces next. He’ll also get some of the pay per view money. It’s unclear what Arum’s cut of the money will be.

“We’re just waiting to hear from Manny,” Crawford said to ESPN.com. “I feel great about it. I feel I was overdue for a big fight. Pacquiao is not a big guy. He comes in at 142, 144, and doesn’t rehydrate a lot.”

Crawford is just waiting to hear the magical words that he’s been selected by Pacquiao for the fight. It obviously helps his chances of getting the fight with Pacquiao that trainer Freddie Roach is interested in Pacquiao fighting Crawford for his final fight.

It’s kind of surprising that Roach would want Pacquiao to fight Crawford next rather than a big name, because there are guys like Saul “Canelo” Alvarez who would bring in much more money for Pacquiao than a little known fighter like Crawford. However, Roach feels that Crawford is a winnable fight for Pacquiao, and he sees it as an easy fight to make because Crawford is with Top Rank like Pacquiao.

I’d be very surprised if Pacquiao doesn’t fight Crawford. I think Pacquiao will select him in order to please Arum. I don’t think the fight will turn Crawford into a star though. I see Crawford winding up in the same place where Brandon Rios and Bradley were in after they fought Pacquiao.

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Both guys fought Pacquiao and neither of them became PPV attractions afterwards. The only thing that came from them fighting Pacquiao was them getting big paydays. I think Crawford lacks the hand speed, crushing power, fighting style and the charisma to become a PPV attraction.

Crawford is a counter puncher, and he doesn’t have the Mayweather-esque type of talent or physical presence to become a PPV type guy in my opinion. I see Crawford as just another champion that brings in decent ratings on HBO, but won’t get a huge bounce to become a PPV star after he fights Pacquiao.

I think it’s a waste for Arum and Pacquiao to have Pacquiao’s final fight against Crawford or Bradley, when there can more money made against different fighters like Canelo or even Khan. I don’t think Khan is a great fight for Pacquiao either. Arum and Pacquiao should hold out for a Mayweather rematch or try and get Canelo for the fight.

Arum and Canelo’s promoter Oscar De La Hoya are communicating now, so this could help make a fight between Pacquiao and Canelo possible. The only things that might get in the way of a Pacquiao-Canelo fight from taking place is Arum, or the World Boxing Council.

Canelo seems like he wants to hold into his newly won WBC middleweight title rather than giving it up immediately. Gennady Golovkin is the WBC #1 mandatory challenger right now, and he’s supposed to be getting a fight for the WBC title next. For Canelo to fight someone else besides Golovkin, he would need to have the WBC allow him to bypass him to face Pacquiao or someone else that he would prefer to fight.

The WBC can change their rules if they want to in order to allow Canelo to steer around Golovkin for the money fight against Pacquiao. But it would also require that Arum be interested in making a fight between Pacquiao and Canelo. There’s no use talking about a Pacquiao-Canelo fight if Arum has his heart set on Pacquiao fighting Crawford with the belief that the fight will turn Crawford into a major star.

You don’t want Arum dragging his feet in the promotions if Pacquiao doesn’t select the guy that he wants him to select. Like I said, I don’t think Crawford is going to be turned into a star if he gets a fight against Pacquiao. At best, Crawford will become a little more popular at the level of a Brandon Rios or Bradley, possibly, but not beyond that.

Pacquiao will likely wind up making much less money fighting Crawford than he would against Canelo. There’s no comparison really. Pacquiao vs. Crawford is probably a 400,000 PPV buy fight. A fight between Pacquiao and Canelo would likely do 2 million PPV buys. Do the math. There would likely be much more interest in a Pacquiao vs. Canelo fight than a Pacquiao vs. Crawford fight.

As for a third fight between Pacquiao and Bradley, I don’t see the interest being there from the boxing public. If Arum wants Pacquiao to fight Bradley again, then that’s a losing situation in my view for Pacquiao. It’s win-win for Bradley, because he gets another payday, but it does very little for Pacquiao. He won’t get huge money in a fight against Bradley like he would against Canelo. The Pacquiao-Bradley fights have already been played out too many times. This is like Arum putting Pacquiao back in with Juan Manuel Marquez yet again, but without the money that fight would make.



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