Broner thinks Arum is blocking Pacquiao fight

By Boxing News - 12/29/2015 - Comments

broner46By Chris Williams: The highly popular Adrien “The Problem” Broner appears to be unhappy with Top Rank promoter Bob Arum, as he feels the 84-year-old promoter is getting in the way of a fight between him and Arum’s superstar fighter Manny Pacquiao for a fight that Broner would like to take on April 9th in Las Vegas, Nevada.

This is expected to be the 37-year-old Pacquiao’s final fight of his career before he retires to a life in politics in his home country of the Philippines. Arum has laid out three opponents – Terence Crawford, Tim Bradley and Amir Khan – for Pacquiao to pick from. He was supposed to select one of them by December 11th of this month.

However, Pacquiao’s adviser Michael Koncz contacted Broner on his own to discuss having him being Pacquiao’s next opponent. It doesn’t look like that’s going to fly with the 84-year-old Arum, as according to the latest boxing news, he’s not going to make that fight happen.

Pacquiao’s choices are the same three opponents – Bradley, Crawford and Khan – that Arum originally listed for him to choose from. It’s unclear what will happen if Pacquiao says no to those guys. Will Arum stand firm to insist on Pacquiao fighting one of them, or will he bend to the wishes of the Filipino star to find a new group of candidates, or better yet to make a fight against him and Broner? This is going to be interesting.

You can imagine other potential Top Rank signees might be watching this to see how it plays out. Does Pacquiao end up doing what Arum wants him to, or is he given freedom to select his opponent? You have to wonder why a fighter that has brought the money that Pacquiao has brought to Top Rank would be given three poor choices for opponents as the ones that Arum picked out for Pacquiao’s April fight.

“Bob Arum [expletive] don’t want to make the fight because he’s upset I ain’t sign with him when he tried to sell me a dream at his crib in LA,” Broner said on his Twitter.

This is what Broner said on Instagram:

”I don’t give a [expletive] who I fight. If Manny Pacquiao want to make this fight happen in April, I’m ready and if that [expletive] don’t go through then I will just beat the [expletive] out of Floyd Mayweather fighter Ashley Theophane in the beginning of March #PointBlankPeriod.”

It’s too bad Pacquiao will be stuck fighting Crawford, Bradley or Khan for his final fight for his career, because those are really terrible choices for Pacquiao. None of the fights will likely make a lot of money. There’s no imagination at all with those three poor choices. You’d like to think that Arum would make it interesting for Pacquiao for his final fight by offering him a fight against Saul “Canelo” Alvarez or Broner. Those far superior choices that throwing Crawford, Bradley and Khan’s name up for him to choose from and then standing firm on those choices. Pacquiao already fought Bradley twice, so why would he even be mentioned? That’s like Arum trotting out Brandon Rios again and throwing his name in the pot simply because he’s one of his recognizable Top Rank stable fighters. Pacquiao already beat Bradley in both of their fights in the minds of a lot of boxing fans. Crawford doesn’t have the personality, recognizable name or an exciting style for a fight against him to be worthwhile in my view. I see Crawford as someone that will never be a star in the sport. I just seem him as similar to Viktor Postol, a guy that is a good fighter but who will likely never become a PPV attraction for one reason or another.

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If Arum is going to block Broner from being able to fight Pacquiao, then it looks like Broner will need to fight the 35-year-old Theophane then. That’s not a good fight. It’s probably about one of the worst that Broner could take because Theophane is unknown in the United States, and he’s not ranked in the top 15 by any of the sanctioning bodies. Theophane is just one of Mayweather’s older fighters in his Mayweather Promotions stable.

Theophane is a guy that Pablo Cano beat a couple of years ago. He’s got a lot of limitations to his game. But the real negative aspect about Broner fighting Theophane is that it won’t increase his popularity. It would be another wasted fight for Broner like his fights against Khabib Allakhverdiev, John Molina, Emmanuel Taylor, Carlos Molina and Gavin Rees. Broner needs the bigger fights like the ones he’s had in the past against Shawn Porter, Marcos Maidana and Paulie Malignaggi.



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