By Dan Ambrose: The Vice President for Golden Boy Promotions Eric Gomez says that the only fight for Manny Pacquiao is Floyd Mayweather Jr. next year if Pacquiao gets by Antonio Margarito this Saturday night. The World Boxing Organization (WBO) won’t be stripping Pacquiao of his WBO title if he captures the WBC junior middleweight strap this Saturday in his fight with Margarito, because Pacquiao has made it pretty clear that he doesn’t intend on staying at junior middleweight.
This really is the only real choice Pacquiao has unless his promoter Bob Arum wants to continue to match up with his Top Rank stable fighters. Pacquiao has already fought Miguel Cotto and Joshua Clottey in his last two fights, both Top Rank fighters. Margarito is another Top Rank fighter. The only other fighter in his stable that Arum might choose to match Pacquiao up with is Julio Cesar Chavez Jr., but if that fights going to happen, Arum would be better off having it take place next while Pacquiao is used to fighting at a higher weight. Chavez Jr. is a middleweight and has to fight hard to make 154. Pacquiao could fight Chavez at a catch-weight, but it was thought that the Margarito fight was going to be the last of Pacquiao’s catch-weight fights. Chavez would be an awful choice for Pacquiao in terms of a competitive fight. But then again, so was the Clottey fight and that made a decent profit. I see the fight being made for profit only and not for boxing fans because Chavez hasn’t proven he even deserves to be ranked in the top 15 in the middleweight division.
Mayweather might be more willing to agree to fighting Pacquiao without him taking the blood tests at this point. Mayweather and Pacquiao’s last attempted negotiations went down the tubes over the drug testing and Pacquiao ended up fighting Clottey instead. Mayweather is now facing legal problems and getting a ton of money a fight against Pacquiao will certainly help. Also, if Mayweather does have to do any time in jail, he needs to fight Pacquiao before that happens because there’s no telling how much time Mayweather could end up serving if any at all.
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