By Giancarlo Malinconico: Floyd Mayweather first agreed, during the negotiations for a March 2010 bout, that Manny Pacquiao must undergo random blood testing up to 14 days before the fight. Now that Pacquiao has agreed to that — surprise — 14 days is not good enough, and now he is demanding that the tests be conducted up to fight night. It is ridiculous to ask for blood testing within days of a fight because blood tests do take a physical toll on fighters. If you want simple evidence of that: just watch the 24/7 series featuring Mayweather and Shane Mosley in which the United States Anti Doping Agency had to wait hours for Mayweather to settle down because it arrived while he was in the middle of training — so much for the notion that drawing less than a teaspoon full of blood doesn’t hurt anybody.
All of the “armchair” accusations that Pacquiao is using Performance Enhancing Drugs (PEDs) are unfounded. Pacquiao is just a better fighter at the higher weights. Pacquiao was knocked out when he was fighting under 120 pounds early in his career, but when he moved up in weight, his body was more solid and he was better able to take punches. When Pacquiao moved up to 135 pounds and higher, he further improved in those aspects while also maintaining his punching power and speed.
Yes, Floyd beat a 38-year-old Shane Mosley who was clearly past his prime. That changes nothing. The fight had 1.4 million pay-per-view buys, a similar number of buys that the Pacquiao-Miguel Cotto bout had. (Besides, something tells me that Pacquiao would have stopped Shane before six rounds if he fought him.) The Plan B excuse Floyd has now for not fighting Manny is that he wants testing up to the day of the fight. If, however, the media begins to criticize Floyd for going back on his original proposal, Floyd can always go to Plan C: request a 60/40 purse split in his favor.
Floyd has already stated that he can make 40 million dollars or more fighting anyone, and that he does not need Manny. Well perhaps Floyd believes that he can fight another past-his-prime fighter with a name or a smaller fighter with a name, and make “close” to the same money he would in an extremely dangerous bout with Pacquiao. I do not agree. If the Floyd-Pacquiao bout does not take place over Floyd’s unreasonable random-drug-testing demand, or a 60/40 purse-split demand, there will be a backlash.
In my heart of hearts, I think Floyd realizes that he is getting older, and a fight with Pacquiao is too risky for him at this point in his career; therefore, the bout will probably not happen – I hope that I am wrong.
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