By Chris Williams: Unbeaten Floyd Mayweather Jr. has reportedly asked for $100 million to fight Manny Pacquiao in a mega fight that doesn’t appear to happening anytime soon unfortunately. Mayweather obviously is looking to get as much as he can for the fight, but his asking price is going to have to come down a tad for the fight to get made. Someone working for Mayweather had secret talks with Bob Arum [Pacquiao’s promoter] recently to try and get the fight made but it looks like things didn’t work out form what Arum is saying.
In an interview at mpboxing.com, Arum said “Went through negotiations with Mayweather, nobody knew about it. Some group came in and they wanted to put it on in a particular country and Mayweather asked for a number that was so high, it indicated that he didn’t want to fight. Take a guess at the number that he asked for, for himself? One hundred. That’s right, $100 million. F–k, I mean, who’s going to pay him $100 million? I mean, unless Manny Pacquiao fights for nothing, how can you do the fight? He [talking about Mayweather] can’t say no, he doesn’t want the fight, so you price yourself out.”
Arum doesn’t seem to understand what Mayweather is saying here. Like a lot of slick negotiators, Mayweather is starting high and then will no doubt come down. But that’s what negotiations are all about. Arum is supposed to haggle with Mayweather to cut it down to a more realistic price. I do think Mayweather deserves more than a 50-50 cut because he’s the unbeaten fighter and has taken on quality fighters all his career. Mayweather has the silky moves and the crowd-leasing skills. I can see Mayweather getting a 60-40 cut. I don’t even think the Mayweather-Pacquiao fight will bring in anywhere near $100 million, so that obviously has come down a lot.
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