By Eric Thomas: According to ESPN, WBO welterweight champion Manny Pacquiao has softened his stance pertaining to the Olympic style random blood testing issue. Previously, Pacquiao was only willing to have limited testing with a cutoff point of point of 24 days before the fight with Floyd Mayweather Jr. This wasn’t what Mayweather wanted, though, as he asked for testing to be conducted up to 14 days before the fight.
The two fighters went their separate ways over this one point, with Pacquiao moving on to beat Joshua Clottey last March and Mayweather moving forward and defeating Shane Mosley. Now two days after Mayweather’s win over Mosley, it looks like Pacquiao is giving in a little about the blood testing that Mayweather wants, saying to ESPN and his official website: “I am willing to help the sport for the future of the sport. I do not want to see anyone cheat or cheat the sport. For that reason, I am willing to consider taking blood as close as 14 days prior to the fight, as long as my opponent does the same and it is not a lot of blood, just enough to take the test.”
Wow! This is great news if this turns out to be the case. The only thing now is whether Floyd will be willing to agree to the limited testing. Before, Mayweather thought two weeks was an acceptable point to stop the blood testing, but now he may be singing a different tune. Mayweather has said recently that Pacquiao would have to take the blood tests all the way up to the fight, and not just until two weeks before the fight.
Will Mayweather give in on this to make the fight happen? It’s hard to see him not doing it. Then fight is too huge for him to be stubborn about this and insist that Pacquiao take the tests all the way up until a day before the fight. Mayweather right now is riding high off his win over Mosley, so you really can’t be too sure what Mayweather is going to ask for in this case. He made a guaranteed $22 million for the Mosley fight and it could end up being more than that if the fight does especially well in pay-per-view sales. However, there are no other big named fighters like Pacquiao that will bring in the kind of money that Mayweather wants. He just finished fight Mosley, who is probably the 3rd most popular fighter in the welterweight division behind Mayweather and Pacquiao.
Pacquiao says “I do not want anyone having an unfair advantage where someone may get hurt. I am willing to do my part to help the sport out.”
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