After a heated week of hostile back-and-forth negotiating in the press trying to sign a Floyd Mayweather Jr. vs. Manny Pacquiao bout, it appears as though talks may come to a head Monday as a multi million dollar game of chicken now looks set to reach a climax.
Top Rank’s Bob Arum told multiple news outlets on Sunday that his final offer to Team Mayweather / Golden Boy Promotions will be to allow them to present their case to the Nevada State Athletic Commission, and if the commission agrees with implementing random blood testing, Pacquiao will abide. If they do not, the issue is dead.
Arum followed up by stating that unless the above was agreed to by Team Mayweather on Monday, Top Rank would look to sign a fight between Manny Pacquiao and Paul Malignaggi, killing the proposed super fight. Surprisingly (or not), Arum’s latest proclamation was in stark contrast to Manny Pacquiao’s personal statement Sunday, explaining he would submit to three blood tests as part of the contract.
Arum’s ultimatum did not sit well with Golden Boy’s Richard Schaefer.
“It does not make sense for this to become a commission matter,” Schaefer told Yahoo Sports on Sunday night. “This is a contractual matter. The commission did not decide the weights or the purse split or how the foreign television rights would be sold. If this is Bob’s final ultimatum, then that’s what it is. That is his decision if he wants to take that position. I very much hope this fight can be made, but the reason it is at a standstill is because of the way they have handled things.”
It is currently unclear what comes next.
Team Mayweather has stated emphatically they have no back up plan (frowning on Top Rank’s threats of turning to replacement opponents) and that they are committed to making the fight.
But Random testing is something they will not let up on.
“Random is random,” Team Mayweather’s Leonard Ellerbe told Yahoo on Sunday. “That is what we want and it has not changed.”
Manny Pacquiao agreed to three blood tests when he spoke out from the Philippines Sunday, even though they are above and beyond what the Nevada State Athletic Commission requires.
“These are my specifications for this fight regarding blood testing,” Pacquiao exclaimed. “I have offered to give a blood sample the day of the announcement of the fight at the press (conference). I have offered to give a blood sample 30 days before the fight. I am willing to give blood immediately after the fight is over inside my dressing room. I am also willing to give urine tests at anytime any where everyday leading up to the fight.”
His statement of what testing he would accept did not come without him voicing his extreme displeasure over anyone questioning his integrity.
“These accusations of me using any performance enhancing supplements are totally unwarranted and unjustified,” an angry Pacquiao explained. “I should not have to prove myself as I have always done what the commission has asked me to do and I have never ever swayed from that. Never has there been a time where anything I have ever done has been in question. I stand behind my honor and my integrity.”
Pacquiao made it very clear in his statement he did not want to have blood drawn in the days leading up to the fight as he believes it is a distraction and an detriment.
”The truth is taking blood out of my body does not seem natural to me and mentally I feel it will weaken me if blood is taken from me just days before the fight. That does not make sense to me why anyone would do that.”
Many around him are alluding to the fact that Pacquiao is extremely offended by the unfounded steroid insinuations being made public in a Golden Boy press release before Christmas despite both sides having signed a non disclosure agreement.
Unfortunately it is now something that can never be taken back, and will always be a sub plot of the fight (should it take place).
If any hope remains, it shines through in the fact that Pacquiao hasn’t walked away over the subtle accusations (despite a pending defamation lawsuit)…
and Richard Schaefer’s continued desire that a “cutoff” date can be agreed upon where random testing can be done up to a pre determined date close(r) to the fight.
“… It is a matter of the two sides working out the specifics of the cutoff date to assure it will still be effective,” Schaefer said this weekend after revealing they had backed off on insisting it be the USADA who would conduct any such tests.
With Pacquiao stating Sunday “I feel it will weaken me if blood is taken from me just days before the fight,” we can only hope that means there is still room to maneuver and reach a last minute compromise.
If there is not, and neither side backs down… the fight could very well fall apart completely if Arum follows through on signing Pacquiao to another fight later today.
It’s a worse case scenario where everyone loses.
Pacquiao moves on under a cloud of suspicion to a much lesser fight. Mayweather walks away from an astronomical sum of his beloved ‘Money’, and does so with the moniker as the No. 2 pound-for-pound fighter in the world. He loses the opportunity to eclipse Pacquiao at present and his legacy arguably takes a back seat as well. The sport of boxing takes yet another in a long line of black eyes in the view of the general public, and Fight Fans everywhere are cheated out of one of the biggest fights in history.
Here’s to hoping cooler heads prevail.
