Sulaiman: Pacquiao-Marquez 4 is only interesting to their fans

By Boxing News - 10/29/2012 - Comments

Image: Sulaiman: Pacquiao-Marquez 4 is only interesting to their fansBy Chris Williams: World Boxing Council president Jose Sulaiman sees the December 8th rematch between Manny Pacquiao and Juan Manuel Marquez as mainly catering to their Mexican and Filipino fans for this their fourth between them at the MGM Grand in Las Vegas, Nevada.

Sulaiman said to Yahoo Deportes “It’s a fight without a championship at stake. It’s a fight that’s only interesting for those in the Philippines and Mexico. Nobody else in the world cares. It’s a fight where the sole purpose is to fill a date, and that’s all.”

Oh, I’m sure that Pacquiao’s fans as well as Marquez’s fans will say that the entire world is eager like mad to see a fourth fight between them but they’d likely be wrong because the excitement from this fight has pretty much run it’s course and it’s like watching Rocky 4 or the millionth time. It’s no longer interesting for a lot of boxing fans and you just wonder if this is the only thing that Pacquiao’s promoter Bob Arum has going for his Filipino fighter nowadays.

The fear is that we may see Pacquiao-Marquez 5, 6, 7, 8, 9 and 10, as long as their loyal fans keep purchasing the fight in high numbers or tuning in for it on Mexican and Filipino television. Their fight is successful just from their own fans and they don’t really need the rest of the world to purchase it on pay per view for those two fighters to make a big killing. I guess that’s why Arum is looking to put Mexico vs. the Philippine type fights like Miguel Vazquez vs. Mercito Gesta on the undercard.

As far as the fight not having a championship at stake, the World Boxing Organization has reportedly put up a made up strap called fighter “fighter of the decade” championship for this bout. It’s created specifically for this fight, and I can only imagine what the sanctioning fee will be for the fight. If it’s 3%, the WBO will make a killing for this fight. That’s a ton of cash. Yahoo reports that the WBC offered to have their WBC Diamond strap up for grabs for this fight, but it doesn’t look like there was any interest in having that bout.



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