By Jason Kim: In the latest boxing news, Top Rank promoter Bob Arum recently said that it would be Floyd Mayweather’s fault if the mega fight between Floyd and Manny Pacquiao doesn’t get made, because Pacquiao recently agreed to the Olympic style blood tests up until 14 days before a potential fight with Mayweather. This is in effect is what Mayweather wanted previously in order for him to fight Pacquiao.
Mayweather hasn’t said what he’ll do yet, although he has made some comments in the media about wanting Pacquiao to take random blood tests all the way up to the fight instead of having them stop at 14 days before the fight. Mayweather and Pacquiao attempted to put together a fight several months ago, but the negotiations pretty much died when the two fighters couldn’t agree on the cutoff date for the blood testing that Mayweather wanted. Pacquiao agreed to have blood testing done until 24 days before the fight but Mayweather wanted 14 days. Now Pacquiao is giving Mayweather exactly what he wanted and yet there is no word from Mayweather or his management about whether this is acceptable or not.
It was learned yesterday that Mayweather and Shane Mosley were only tested by the United States Anti Doping Agency up to 18 and 19 days before their May 1st fight in regards to blood testing. Now if Mayweather is asking for even more than 14 days, which is better than what Mayweather did for his bout with Mosley, then it’s understandable why Arum would think that Mayweather is to blame for the Mayweather-Pacquiao mega fight not happening.
Pacquiao isn’t comfortable with having blood taken from his body, believing that it weakens him for several days after he has the blood drawn. You can’t blame Pacquiao for wanting as big a cushion he can get from the last blood test until the fight, because he doesn’t want to be weakened during training and also doesn’t want to come into his mega fight with Mayweather at less than 100%. Pacquiao already has it tough on him that he’s the smaller fighter than Mayweather at 5’6” compared to 5’8”.
Then if you throw in the blood tests which will affect Pacquiao a lot more than Mayweather, it really gives Mayweather a huge advantage in the fight. You can’t blame Arum, Freddie Roach and Pacquiao for not wanting the blood tests. It’s great that Pacquiao has agreed to the two week cutoff, but if Mayweather then lowers it below 14, it could give the perception that he doesn’t want the fight to happen and is looking for an easy way out.
Comments are closed.