Despite
whatever rhetoric has been uttered recently, the truth of the matter is that Floyd
Mayweather was always going to fight on May 5th at the MGM Grand
against someone other than Manny Pacquiao.
Pacquiao, in turn, was always going to choose an opponent from a quartet of
potential opponents laid out to him by Bob Arum (my apologies for being the
bearer of reality).
This
week, Arum met with developers who will be in charge of constructing a stadium (with
a capacity of 38,000 for Pacquiao's next assignment) in Las Vegas on Spring Mountain
Road and Las Vegas Blvd. at the site of the long gone Frontier Hotel.
“It's
fine,” Arum said on Thursday. “We have the plans and everything is ready to go.”
This
structure will harken back to the makeshift arenas that staged fights in this
city back in the ‘80s and ‘90s. Don't expect any luxury suites or anything of that
sort. This won’t be Cowboys Stadium.
“There will be no amenities in the stadium but it's a big, big area. There will
be concession stands and so forth and Porta-Potties and everything but the
stadium itself will be like the stadiums that we had- and this is the same guy
that built those stadiums in Caesars Palace, in the Mirage - and it doesn't
have any amenities inside but plenty of amenities around it,” said Arum. “There
will be room for a big area for fans and there's a 2,400 [car] parking garage
and so I'm very confident it will be perfect. And then we get by June and if
there's a big fight in November, then we can get a bubble over it to enclose
it.”
As
for how long it would take to construct, Arum explained, “You have to
understand, the place that we're looking at already is paved and has all the
electricity. They spent $200,000 to put in electricity already, the lines and
so forth. It will take a little less than three months to erect the stadium.”
There
are, of course, the issues of gaining building permits, doing environmental
surveys as well as other red tape. But as this jurisdiction has shown recently,
money talks very loudly in the 702. These steps will be a mere formality (but
some like my friend, John Chavez, remain skeptical of this whole plan: http://www.theboxingtruth.com/article.php?id=2035)
It
looks like Pacquiao versus TBA will take place on June 9th.
“Well, I assume they're not going to move off May 5, Mayweather. So yeah, we're
talking June 9th with some other opponent,” confirmed Arum. But the
question is, while this stadium will give the general public much more of an
opportunity to purchase tickets, will either Pacquiao or Mayweather face a
backlash as they continue to delay their mega-fight? We may already be at a
point of diminishing returns as they face other foes in 2012. A 38,000-seat
stadium makes perfect sense for Pacquiao-Mayweather but for Pacquiao and say...Tim
Bradley? Well, that's a whole ‘nother story.
The
latest bit of hysteria sparked as the two fighters spoke on the phone Wednesday
night (Yes, OMG, they talked! Next thing you know, they will be following each
other on Twitter!). However, Arum says that there's nothing to read into their
conversation. “There's nothing significant out of it because what happened is
Floyd has been talking by phone- almost every other day to Mike Koncz in the
Philippines - and yesterday [Wednesday], I guess it was in the evening here,
the next day in the Philippines, Manny was in the room with Michael and he
said, ‘Do you want to talk to Manny?’ and Floyd and he talked for a couple of
minutes. That's the extent of everything; it's nothing. And they called me
this morning to say that Manny had told Philippines television that he had
talked to Floyd.”
Right
now, it seems like the next-best-chance (and perhaps last before the public
completely runs out of patience) to make Pacquiao-Mayweather a reality is
November. It says here they either get ‘er done by then or forever hold their
peace, move on and live with the consequences. All the talk and posturing has
become more mind-numbing than a Republican debate.
Arum
says, “That makes all the sense in the world. What everybody should be doing is
sitting down, having each guy take an interim fight, Floyd on May 5th,
Manny June 9th, and sign a fight now for November 5th.
Make it like that biggest thing ever to hit boxing, three events, two
preliminary events and then the big final. Everybody will go crazy- but you
can't talk to anybody. I think it would be wonderful if everybody sat down and
we did this plan; let them fight whoever in May. We'll fight whoever in June.
We'll come together in November and sign everything now so we don't have to go
through this sh*t.
“If
you're not under pressure with this, with dates and courts, then you can, in a
week, hammer out every single point.”
HEAT
IS ON
Some
will wonder just how practical it is for a stadium to be built in Las Vegas for
a fight not involving both Pacquiao and Mayweather. One of the issues is just
how hot it gets by the summer months in this city. One of the first fights I
ever attended was Oscar De La Hoya's first go-round with Julio Cesar Chavez
Sr. in 1996, ironically the same weekend in June as Pacquiao's upcoming
bout. And while Arum told me, “There's no heat in June,” I distinctly remember
just how scorching it was that day. I actually had a ticket to that fight and found
out how a hot dog feels on the grill as I was sitting on those aluminum
bleachers.
But
hey, it's dry heat, right?
JMO
For the first time since this long, drawn-out
saga began at the end of 2009, I think there is a real, distinct possibility
that Pacquiao-Mayweather becomes a reality for November. I never bought into
the false hope and the hoopla of the past for various reasons.
But then, I don't know a damn thing and I
what I think doesn't really matter.
THE
GHOST
Even
Golden Boy Promotions CEO Richard Schaefer has had his fill of press releases
from Robert “The Ghost” Guerrero calling for a fight with Mayweather on May 5th.
“I agree with you,” he said, laughing at the onslaught sent recently by his
publicist, Mario Serrano, “and I explained it to them as well. I said, ‘Look,
we had the perfect fight lined up. We were going to sell out ‘The Shark Tank’
in San Jose and it was a big fight against Marcos Maidana [in August] and
obviously and unfortunately, the injury happened. So it's not that Golden Boy
didn't deliver him a big fight. It was a breakthrough fight, obviously. He's a
multiple-weight division champion already. So he's certainly ready for the big
fights and that's what we're planning on doing. But you cannot at that level
just say, ‘Hey, I'm back; my shoulder feels great and now get me Mayweather.’
It just doesn't work that way.
“And
do I think it would be a competitive fight; do I think it would be a good
fight, a good promotion as well? Absolutely. But these fights you just can't
say, ‘OK, I'm ready now. Let’s fight Mayweather.’ So what that means is a
Robert Guerrero maybe fighting the winner of Devon Alexander and Marcos
Maidana. I could see that as a potentially good fight. You win a fight like
that, do I think it's a giant step closer to getting one of the big fights?
Absolutely.”
Right
now, what they're doing seems counterproductive and more than one writer I know
is threatening to put anything put out by Serrano in the “spam” category.
Schaefer concluded, “I think Robert Guerrero is a tremendous, tremendous
fighter but sending out a press release every day, at one point, certain people
are going to be like, ‘OK, hey dude, relax.’”
APRIL
SHO(WERS)
Schaefer
was in New York on some business, talking to the networks and it looks like IBF
bantamweight titlist Abner Mares will be making his return in the spring.
“And it could be that Jorge Linares would be on that show; I'm holding that for
April 21st, the Nokia Theater in downtown L.A. So we're going to see if we can
do that from there or Mexico. There is interest from Cancun as well. It would
be on Showtime,” said Schaefer, who added that WBA 118-pound beltholder Anselmo
Moreno could also be on this card.
FRIDAY
FLURRIES
“War
at Woodland Hills” takes place tonight at the Warner Center Marriott and
features the likes of Donyil Livingston and Zachary Wohlman among many others.
For more information log on to www.bashboxing.com...From
Feb. 18th to March 3rd, EPIX will feature the Klitschko
brothers and Alexander Povetkin title fights...Super middleweight champion
Andre Ward will be part of the Showtime commentary crew on tonight's edition of
“ShoBox” featuring Guillermo Rigondeaux against Rico Ramos...Kevin Iole of
Yahoo! Sports penned this column on some of the issues surrounding
Pacquiao-Mayweather: http://sports.yahoo.com/box/news?slug=ki-iole_mayweather_pacquiao_011912...”Fight
Camp 360” on Showtime for Victor Ortiz-Andre Berto II premieres Feb. 1st at 10 p.m. ET/PT...So will the Ravens actually take Ray Lewis out of the game
in certain situations? Sounds like blasphemy…You can check out the latest
edition of Maxboxing Radio with Corey Erdman and Yours Truly right here: http://www.blogtalkradio.com/maxboxingradio/2012/01/19/ramos-rignondeauxnbc-fight-night-preview...
