Pacquiao inks new deal with Paradigm Sports, is Conor McGregor next up?

By Boxing News - 10/12/2020 - Comments

By Allan Fox: Superstar Manny Pacquiao moved a step closer to a big-money clash against Conor McGregor by inking a new deal with Paradigm Sports. The former eight-division world champion Pacquiao (62-7-2, 39 KOs) announced the new deal with Paradigm Sports on Sunday and seemed pleased.

Pacquiao has already made it known that he wants to co-promote the McGregor fight. We’ll see if that works. If Manny co-promotes, then we’ll likely see a lot of his fighters from his Pacquiao promotions on the undercard. Most boxing fans don’t care about the undercards, so they’ll be okay if there are a bunch of obscure fighters they’ve never heard of or seen before.

Will fans pay $100 to watch Pacquiao vs. McGregor?

We’ll see what the price tag is for the Pacquiao-McGregor fight. It’s hard not to imagine it selling for $100 per household, which would a high price for right now with the pandemic crippling the U.S job market.

That kind of price for a mismatch might be off-putting in the eyes of a lot of boxing fans. It would feed into what UFC president Dana White said recently about how a lot of boxing events are ‘going out of business’ type of affairs.

Image: Pacquiao inks new deal with Paradigm Sports, is Conor McGregor next up?

The promoters put together horrible fights, market them to the hilt, and then get out of town when the match fails to entertain.

The fight with former UFC star McGregor still hasn’t been made yet, but it’s possible we could see the two in December or January. Boxing fans have a mixed view on a match between the 32-year-old McGregor and Pacquiao.

Some love the fight, whereas others view it as a pathetic cash grab. It would be better if Pacquiao were to face a top boxer like Terence Crawford or Errol Spence Jr, but he won’t get much attention – or money – fighting them compared to a match against McGregor.

The casual boxing and MMA fans would be more enthusiastic about a fight between Manny and Conor than against any of the current fighters in boxing. That’s a reflection of the lack of stars in the sport right now.

Pacquiao-McGregor heading for 2021

Canelo is now the #1 fighter in the sport, but he’s not fighting this year because of his lawsuit with DAZN. With Canelo out of commission in 2020, there’s no one near as popular to take up the slack.

Image: Pacquiao inks new deal with Paradigm Sports, is Conor McGregor next up?

If Pacquiao does fight McGregor, it’s expected to take place in 2021. There’s a small chance it could take place in December, but probably not going to happen. If Manny and Conor waiting until 2021 with the hope of taking advantage of crowds coming back, they could be wasting their time. Crowds might not be allowed back until the number of positive cases for COVID 19 begins dropping, and that’s not happening.

The organizers of the Pacquiao vs. McGregor fight will want to ramp it up slowly with a long promotion to take advantage of Conor’s superb marketing skills. Pacquiao isn’t someone that will be able to trade trash talk with McGregor the way Mayweather did in their fight in 2017.

Can Pacquiao keep up with McGregor?

They might need someone from Team Pacquiao to do most of the talking. It can’t be Buboy Fernandez or Freddie Roach. there needs to be someone that can be the guy that does the heavy promotional work for Manny. It’ll be up to them to decide. It won’t work well if McGregor is talking circles around Pacquiao during all the news conferences, while he laughs and looks uncomfortable.

Pacquiao will be turning 42 in December, and a fight with McGregor would be good cash out before retiring. Of course, if there’s another big fight against someone like Floyd Mayweather Jr, that would be a tempting match to take for the Filipino superstar.

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The 43-year-old Mayweather has been reluctant to get back in the ring with Pacquiao since beating him by a 12 round decision in 2015 in the ‘Fight of the Century.

Unfortunately, that wasn’t an exciting match-up, and many boxing fans felt that they didn’t get their money’s worth for the card. Pacquiao and Mayweather’s main event was boring, and the undercard was filled with mismatches and noninteresting fights.