THE FIGHT OF THE MILLENIUM
Photo credit: AFP / Getty Images Manny Pacquiao's promoter says he's ready to begin negotations on a possible fight with the undefeated Floyd Mayweather Jr.
Manny Pacquiao promoter: Let's do Mayweather fight
November 19, 2009 By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
A promoter for Manny Pacquiao says he's ready to begin negotiations for a fight with Floyd Mayweather Jr.
Floyd Mayweather Jr. against Manny Pacquiao.
A fight too big not to happen.
Bob Arum of Pacquiao promoter Top Rank said Thursday he’s ready to negotiate a showdown between the top pound-for-pound fighters in the world, even suggesting potential locations and acknowledging that his Filipino star is willing to fight at 147 pounds.
Arum is waiting to hear from Golden Boy Promotions chief Richard Schaefer, who is acting as an intermediary between Top Rank and Mayweather Promotions, two companies with an acrimonious relationship. Schaefer has assisted Mayweather’s team on his most recent fights.
“I have to have discussions with our side, and when the time is right, I will be talking to Bob,” Schaefer told The Associated Press. “That will probably take place face to face, and I intend that to happen very shortly.”
Mayweather’s adviser, Leonard Ellerbe, left no doubt that Mayweather is ready to get in the ring with the man who many believe replaced him atop the pound-for-pound list.
“Floyd has made it perfectly clear to Team Mayweather and the rest of the world that he wants to give the fans what they want, and that’s Mayweather versus Pacquiao,” Ellerbe said.
It would be the biggest event in the sport since the days of Sugar Ray Leonard and Tommy Hearns, when marquee fights were held under the stars in the outdoor arena at Caesar’s Palace.
Perhaps it’s fitting that Las Vegas officials and casino magnate Steve Wynn have already contacted Arum about staging Pacquiao-Mayweather on the Strip. One possibility would be to build a temporary, 30,000-seat outdoor arena on a vacant lot at the old Frontier, where there would be room for corporate hospitality tents and a Super Bowl-like atmosphere.
Another possibility is the Dallas Cowboys’ new stadium. Team owner Jerry Jones has expressed interest in holding major events at his $1.2 billion palace.
Yankees chief operating officer Lonn Trost has said he’d like to see a fight at the new Yankee Stadium, across the street from the building where many of the sports’ greatest battles were waged. The problem is that New York would tax a significant percentage of the revenue, especially for a fight that could generate up to $80 million in purses.
The notion that so many venues are vying for a fight that has yet to be made demonstrates how much attention the sport is receiving. Mayweather is coming off a victory over Juan Manuel Marquez that sold more than 1 million pay-per-views, and Pacquiao’s stoppage of welterweight champion Miguel Cotto on Saturday night is expected to surpass 1.2 million.
“It’s not so much that I give a damn whether this fight happens — I don’t — and for me it’s not the greatest experience doing a promotion with Floyd Mayweather,” Arum said. “But not to do this fight would slow down the momentum of boxing.”
Mainstream sponsors like Pepsi and Subway have shown interest in Pacquiao-Mayweather, one more sign the sport is returning to the popularity level it enjoyed in the early 1980s.
Pacquiao recently made the cover of Time magazine in Asia and is easily the most widely recognized figure in the Philippines, while Mayweather has a magnetic personality that has been showcased everywhere from the WWE to commercials with Bill Kurtis for AT&T.
One of the two has won Ring Magazine’s Fighter of the Year the past three years.
“It has to happen. The stars are aligned and both fighters want it,” said HBO Sports president Ross Greenburg. “If it doesn’t, it would be devastating to the sport.”
Mayweather issued a statement Monday in which he said, “If Manny Pacquiao wants to fight me, all he has to do is step up to the plate and say it himself.”
“The world is much more intrigued by the thought of someone fighting me who can beat me,” Mayweather added. “Manny Pacquiao’s people have done a good job of creating an image of him to be this unbelievable fighter and now the so-called guy to beat me.”
Already, the bluster has begun.
Arum promised that “my guy will make (Mayweather) fight, and once he fights, my guy will knock him out,” while Ellerbe made it perfectly clear how he sees the fight shaking out.
“At the end of the day, we already know that Floyd is the best fighter in all of boxing, and if we’re able to make a deal, he’ll just be proving it to the world,” Ellerbe said. “Nothing has changed. Pacquiao will be no different.”
Pacquiao's PPV numbers add to megafight momentum
By TIM DAHLBERG
AP Boxing Writer
LAS VEGAS — Manny Pacquiao proved he can be a box office hit. Now it's up to Pacquiao and Floyd Mayweather Jr. to see what they can do together.
Pacquiao's big win over Miguel Cotto on Saturday was the biggest boxing show of the year, selling 1.25 million pay-per-view buys to best the 1.05 million sold by Mayweather for his fight with Juan Manuel Marquez in September. The television gross was $70 million, meaning both fighters will pocket millions of dollars more than their guaranteed purses.
The strong numbers not only point to a resurgence in interest in boxing, but add to the momentum for a possible fight next year between Pacquiao and Mayweather that could be the richest ever in the sport.
"They have to deliver," HBO Sports president Ross Greenburg told The Associated Press. "The American public wants that fight."
Promoters for both fighters have already said they plan to begin negotiations soon for the bout, which would likely take place in early May. Las Vegas casinos have the inside track on landing the megafight, though there has also been talk of holding it at the Dallas Cowboys' new stadium, or even at Yankee Stadium.
One thing is certain: There is too much money at stake for either fighter to not make the fight happen.
"The two best pound-for-pound fighters in the world in the same weight class in the prime of their careers," Greenburg said. "It just doesn't get any better than that."
Promoter Bob Arum agreed.
"The way I look at it now, boxing is really on a roll," Arum said. "We would be idiots now to slow the momentum and the only way we can keep the momentum is to make this fight."
Arum, who represents Pacquiao, is expected to begin talks as early as next week with Richard Schaefer, who heads Golden Boy Promotions and will represent Mayweather in the negotiations. Though each fighter believes he should get a bigger percentage of the purse, the total revenues will be so high — that a 50-50 split may not be all that difficult to achieve.
Arum said Pacquiao will end up making some $22 million for his 12th round stoppage of Cotto, while Cotto will end up with around $12 million. That is far higher than either fighter was guaranteed because, as is the case with most big fights, they worked for a percentage of the total sales.
The Pacquiao-Cotto fight also did well at the live box office, with 15,470 tickets sold for a gate of $8.84 million at the MGM Grand hotel.
The potential of a Pacquiao-Mayweather fight is so big that Arum said casino magnate Steve Wynn had already spoken to him about constructing a 30,000-seat outdoor arena on what is now a vacant lot across from his two resorts to host the bout, with other casinos joining in as partners. Outdoor arenas were a staple of the big fights in Las Vegas in the 1980s, beginning with the Muhammad Ali-Larry Holmes fight at Caesars Palace.
"A lot of people are interested," Arum said. "The problem with having it in the East, though, is that the taxes are so big that the fighters would have to give up millions in extra taxes."
Greenburg said the numbers for Pacquiao-Cotto gave HBO its first back-to-back pay-per-view fights that sold more than 1 million homes since 1999, when Lennox Lewis-Evander Holyfield and Oscar De La Hoya-Felix Trinidad did the same thing. The biggest pay-per-view ever was the 2007 fight with De La Hoya and Mayweather that got 2.4 million buys.
Greenburg credited the recent strong sales to a new willingness by promoters to match their best fighters, and to the new — and younger — fans drawn to the sport by the success of the network's "24/7" reality shows in the weeks before the fights.
There would be no lack of material for a Pacquiao-Mayweather show, which would match a Filipino hero with a colorful cast surrounding him against a fighter with a dysfunctional family who has played the role of villain in his biggest fights.
"There's just so much drama and subplots for this," Greenburg said.
November 20, 2009 - 9:04 p.m. Copyright 2009, The Associated Press. The information contained in the AP Online news report may not be published, broadcast or redistributed without the prior written authority of The Associated Press.
Source:
http://www.lufkindailynews.com/news/content/gen/ap/BOX_Pacquiao_Mayweather.htmleather.html
Pacquiao-Mayweather in negotiations
Let the talks begin.
Formal negotiations in an effort to make a megafight between pound-for-pound king Manny Pacquiao and Floyd Mayweather Jr. in the first part of 2010 will open Monday, Golden Boy Promotions CEO Richard Schaefer told ESPN.com.
Noel Celis/AFP/Getty ImagesIn the year's biggest fight, Manny Pacquiao TKO'd Miguel Cotto to win his record seventh different title.Schaefer was on his way Monday morning from Los Angeles to Las Vegas to meet Top Rank's Bob Arum, Pacquiao's promoter, for lunch at the MGM Grand, which has hosted several Pacquiao and Mayweather fights.
"Floyd and me want to see if we can get the fight done," said Schaefer, who, although he doesn't have a promotional contract with Mayweather, has represented him in his past three fights and was asked to represent him in these talks. "The fact that I am flying to Las Vegas to meet with Bob shows you how serious our side is about making the fight.
"Bob and I will approach this without egos and try to get it done under fair terms. Floyd gave me his marching orders and I will see today how it goes and report back."
A pairing of Pacquiao and Mayweather is the biggest fight boxing has to offer and could break all sorts of revenue records.
In the year's biggest fight earlier this month, Pacquiao (50-3-2, 38 KOs) beat Miguel Cotto on a technical knockout in the 12th round to win a welterweight title, his seventh title in a record seven weight divisions.
The fight sold 1.25 million units on pay-per-view and generated more than $70 million in domestic television revenue.
Rocky Widner/NBAE/Getty ImagesFloyd Mayweather Jr. returned from a short-lived retirement in September to dominate lightweight champion Juan Manuel Marquez.
Mayweather (40-0, 25 KOs), the former welterweight champ and pound-for-pound king before a short-lived retirement, returned on Sept. 19 to dominate lightweight champion Juan Manuel Marquez in a lopsided unanimous decision.
That fight generated 1.05 million buys on pay-per-view.
The all-time pay-per-view record is the 2.44 million buys generated by Mayweather's 2007 win against Oscar De La Hoya.
"I can confirm I am meeting with Richard, but I'm not going to talk about the specifics," Arum told ESPN.com. "It's a meeting where we will try to make the fight. Whether it can be made or not in this meeting, I don't know. We'll see what we will see."
Schaefer said he hopes he and Arum can make the fight quickly, rather than dragging the talks out for weeks.
"As part of the negotiations both Bob and I had to agree to keep all discussions confidential," Schaefer said. "No further comments will be made until such time that we either have a deal or the negotiations fall apart."
Source: Dan Rafael is the boxing writer
