By Jim Dower: Ideally, Top Rank promoter Bob Arum would like to have the Nevada Athletic commission reinstate the boxing license for his fighter two-time welterweight champion Antonio Margarito so that Arum could match Margarito against Manny Pacquiao on November 13th in Las Vegas, Nevada. That’s the number #1 choice for Arum. However, if for some reason the Nevada Athletic Commission fail to give Margarito back his boxing license, Arum has other options for Margarito.

Arum will then take him to Texas and/or New Jersey, both of which are eager to put on the Margarito vs. Pacquiao bout. Margarito is probably going to get his boxing license back either way. However, if the Nevada Athletic Commission is smart, they’ll see the opportunity that a fight between Margarito and Pacquiao will be for their state in terms of bringing in money and will grant Margarito his license.
In an article at the LA Times, Arum said “We’re confident we’ll get him [Margarito] here.” However, Arum has a backup plan ready in case Nevada, California, New Jersey and Texas don’t give Margarito back his boxing license. Arum would then take the Pacquiao-Margarito fight out of the United States and put it either in Monterrey, Mexico or Abu Dhabi in the Middle East.

Arum says “It’s not running out of the country. It’s a good economic deal. Manny’s not a fugitive.” Of course, Pacquiao isn’t. However, it would look bad to some people that Pacquiao is fighting someone who can’t get licensed in the United States because he had plaster found in his hand wraps before his fight last year against Shane Mosley. By going out of the country, it will make some people think that Arum is circumventing the boxing commissions.

Pacquiao and Margarito will be fighting for the vacant WBC junior middleweight vacant title. For Pacquiao, this will be an opportunity for him to go after an 8th world title. Arum kicked around the idea of having Pacquiao fight WBA junior middleweight champion Miguel Cotto, who also fights for Arum, for his 8th world title. However, Arum was concerned that the fight might not sell well on pay per view because boxing fans already saw Pacquiao easily beat Cotto by a 12th round knockout last November. No matter how Arum would try to market a rematch, fans would still likely not be interested in paying $50 to see Pacquiao destroy Cotto again.

As it is, Arum may have his hands full trying to sell a fight between Pacquiao and Margarito to the boxing public, because Margarito doesn’t have a huge fan base in the United States, and he was knocked out last year by Mosley. It seems like timing for Arum to match Margarito against Pacquiao. Margarito probably needed another year or so to rebuild his career with some wins over top level fighters to get him back to where he was before his 9th round KO loss to Mosley. Arum isn’t willing to wait, though, and is rushing Margarito back into action against Pacquiao and is going to hope for the best.

This could work against Arum if the fight does poorly on PPV. It would then make it harder – if not impossible – for Arum to ask for a 50-50 split for Pacquiao against Floyd Mayweather Jr. next year. In that case, the fight likely won’t happen because Mayweather won’t agree to fight Pacquiao unless he gets the bigger split. And Mayweather would have Pacquiao’s poor PPV numbers as a reason for wanting a bigger split. Arum will then match Pacquiao up in a rematch with Cotto next year. Who knows what comes after those two fights. Arum will be out of Top Rank fighters and he may have to try and convince Pacquiao to accept a smaller cut against Mayweather.