By Chris Williams: Manny Pacquiao could be back inside the ring against Top Rank fighter Jeff Horn (16-0-1, 11 KOs) in April in Brisbane, Australia. The talk is the fight would take place at the Suncorp Stadium in Brisbane. This is part of Pacquiao’s 85-year-old promoter Bob Arum’s idea to make Pacquiao a worldwide star by having him fight in Australia or some other venue. However, with Pacquiao’s career about to end, it makes one skeptical if that’s Arum’s true goal.
Pacquiao could be facing Terence Crawford in the second half of 2017 the U.S. That’s a fight that Pacquiao will likely lose due to Crawford’s youth and mobility. If Pacquiao retires after that fight, which is what some think will happen, then you can pretty much forget about this idea of Arum’s to turn him into a worldwide star.
“That’s what I want to do with the last period of Manny’s career,” said Arum to the Manilatimes.net. “I want him to be known as a worldwide fighter.”
The idea of Pacquiao fighting Jeff Horn is a confusing one, because there’s no real upside for Pacquiao in taking that fight. Horn isn’t well-known to the U.S audiences, and the money that can be made in that fight is probably not a lot. Why isn’t Arum looking to match Pacquiao against the likes of Danny Garcia, Adrian Broner, Keith Thurman, or Kell Brook? Obviously, those aren’t Top Rank fighters in Arum’s stable, but they’re still better known than Jeff Horn.
There’s more to gain for Pacquiao’s legacy in fighting Thurman, Brook and Garcia than fighting Horn. If Pacquiao is on board with Arum’s match-making at this late stage in his career, then more power to him. However, I don’t see any logic to the idea of Pacquiao fighting Horn or even Lomachenko, who isn’t a big name with casual boxing fans. He’s good a fighter, but he’s not well known with casual fans. even a fight against Crawford doesn’t make sense. He’s not a PPV fighter.
How can Pacquiao become a worldwide star if he’s only going to be fighting in Australia before coming back to the U.S to fight Crawford in the second half of 2017? I don’t understand that move. Will this move make Jeff Horn a star? He’s now working with Arum. It just looks like Arum is having Pacquiao fight mainly fighters in his Top Rank stable before he retires. Is Arum hoping that his Top Rank fighters will become more popular after fighting Pacquiao? 11 out of the last 13 fights of Pacquiao’s career has been against Top Rank fighters. If Pacquiao fights Jeff Horn, Crawford and Vasyl Lomachenko in his next three fights, then he’ll have fought 14 out of his last 16 fights against Top Rank fighters. I think Pacquiao would be better off fighting whoever pays him the most money rather than focusing on Arum’s wishes of him becoming a worldwide star. If that means someone outside of Arum’s Top Rank stable, then that’s what he should be doing.
“There’ll be no Pacquiao-Crawford fight in the first six months of the year definitely,” said Arum. “Only if the fight will be in the United States but we’re not planning the next fight in the United States, so we’re also not planning on Crawford now.”