By Chris Williams: In Friday night’s midnight conference call to the media by Top Rank promoter Bob Arum when asked by Greg Leon of Boxing Talk about who makes the decision about who Manny Pacquiao will be fighting next, Top Rank or Pacquiao, Arum said “It falls on Manny.” But does it really? I only see two names being offered up as opponents by Arum – Miguel Cotto and Antonio Margarito – and both of them coincidentally are members of Arum’s Top Rank stable of fighters.

Out of all the possible fighters in the junior middleweight and welterweight division for Pacquiao to fight, why would these two fighters be selected? If Pacquiao is truly able to pick his next opponent, why would be just so happen to pick two fighters that are both in Arum’s stable of fighters? Why wouldn’t Pacquiao fight someone else in the light middleweight or welterweight divisions? Come on, there’s tons of appealing opponents for Pacquiao to fight. He doesn’t fight just Cotto – again – or Margarito, who can’t even fight in the United States and is disliked by a lot of boxing fans because a plaster-like material was found in his hand wraps last year before his fight against Shane Mosley.

Pacquiao has already beaten Cotto to a pulp. Does Pacquiao really want to fight Cotto again? Is that his idea? Doesn’t Pacquiao have any other ideas for opponents? Margarito is a polarizing figure right now because of the hand wrap issue, and can’t even fight in the U.S. Is Pacquiao okay with that? Pacquiao actually wants to fight Margarito in Mexico. Wouldn’t Pacquiao, if this is his own choice, prefer to fight someone in the United States, like Andre Berto, Paul Williams or Sergio Martinez?

Pacquiao hasn’t fought any of them before, and all of them have a valid boxing license to fight in the United States. And best of all, they are well liked by boxing fans. Wouldn’t one of them be a better choice than to fight Cotto again in a fight that few people want to see or have to travel to Mexico to fight a guy that many boxing fans aren’t happy with right now? I can understand Pacquiao fighting Margarito if he had his boxing license and all the controversy had mostly died down, but he doesn’t.

The fact of the matter is Margarito has only fought once since he served his year suspension, but he didn’t look all that good in his comeback fight against Roberto Garcia in May. Margarito won by a 10 round decision, but his old power wasn’t there for that fight .And Margarito still doesn’t have a boxing license. Why fight him. Is this really Pacquiao’s choice to pick?

I just find it really hard to believe that Pacquiao, with all the names that could be selected for opponents, is looking Cotto and Margarito. It makes me think it’s not really Pacquiao’s choice. Oh, I’m sure he can say no if he wants to, but I think he’s doing whatever is being told to him by Arum. Yeah, it’s Pacquiao’s choice but he’s probably going to do whatever Arum wants him to do in this case.