Floyd Joy Mayweather Jr. is not going to cut and run from Manny Pacquiao…
Not at least until the Undefeated One hears the opening bell in Las Vegas on the momentous night of Nov. 13.
That’s what I say and my grabby friend, Paul The Octopus, backs me up. Or tentacles me up…or something like that.
I’m getting off the wiggle wagon, off the fence. I’m saying book your air and hotel plans now and start lining up your ticket buys.
My gut tells me we’re getting our Boxing Super Bowl this year and not next year.
Mayweather cares about legacy. I mean, he is always talking about how his name and claim to fame belongs on a list with superstars such as Joe Louis, Ray Robinson and even my all time idol and friend, Muhammad Ali.
Mayweather also cares, and not secondarily to historical stature, about money. I mean, doh!
As I’ve noted many times, he is always flashing cash and gaudy jewelry and boasting about his Big Boy Mansion and his glistening Maybach. And some of those $100 bills are said to be authentic which is more than one might say about Mayweather’s well crafted without blemish record.
Paul The Octopus, born in England but now usually submerged in Germany, has been busy with World Cup prognostications but now joins Michael Marley in forecasting Floyd Mayweather Jr. will not cut and run from Manny Pacquiao…at least until Round 1 on Nov. 13 in Las Vegas (Dailymail.UK Photo)
In recent years, he’s gotten away from the ?Pretty Boy Floyd? moniker and emphasized ?Money May.?
I say all this to predict like Paul The Octopus picking World Cup winners that sometime late next week word will leak out that:
a) Mayweather is going to fight Manny Pacquiao on Nov. 13 in Las Vegas or
b) Mayweather is accepting the fight but will defer it into 2011.
c) That, as soon as Krista Ranillo’s “starter marriage” to the Island Express rich guy fizzles, she’ll be buzzing my phone nonstop, pleading for a another chance. I hear she has an aversion to Congressmen.
There is no fourth option here as Mayweather makes a mockery of his undefeated pro career by ducking and dodging Manny Pacquiao.
Boxing clever, shrewdie Bob Arum has already stage managed the situation so that the overiding public percveption will be that Floyd is Duckweather, that he is the one walking away from what he, his father and his uncle-trainer have consistently said will be ?easy work? against the fast but sometimes crude southpaw from Gensan.
One telling apsect here, unless I’ve misread the whole thing and this is just Arum’s ?I Love A Charade? routine, is the pereptual silence from HBO Sports bossman, Ross Greenburg.
Some like to say that Greenburg is not a boxing man and, really, he’s not. His title properly identifies him as the head of all sports properties and programs for the huge premium cable network.
Greenburg is a Big Picture guy, a TV guy who can move from PPV or cable boxing to NFL themed shows to the Bryant Gumbel sports magazine.
I say Arum and Golden Boy are under pressure to deliver The Big Bout to paymaster HBO.
Skeptics did not believe Paul The Octopus but all his World Cup picks have delivered victories. Now the grabby mollusc and Michael Marley predict Mayweather accepts Pacman bout for Nov. 13 in Las Vegas.
Beyond Pacquiao, what superstar does Arum have?
Beyond their alliance with Mayweather, what superstar does de la Hoya’s outfit have. Oddly enough, GBP’s two best fighters appear to be UK residents Amir Khan and David Haye.S
Speaking of the Silence of the Lambs, the total wall of silence from publicity shy Al Haymon and anyone involved in actual negotions here has been just right?not to hot, not too cold, but just right.
All Mayweather has to do now is say yes to Pacquiao and the public perception gets flipped. Then the perception will be that, having been challenged mano a mano, Mayweather is answering the call to battle.
The stew is already spicy enough but a Mayweather manning his battle stations move will be like adding gunpowder to the public demand.
Mayweather will not dissapoint.
Do you think Floyd wants to go the barbershop and get ragged about ducking Pacman? I don’t.
Mayweather may roll with a goon squad protecting him physically but they can’t squelch the voice of catcalling fans.
This just in: all eight tentacles of Paul The Octopus are vibrating a message and it is that Mayweather will step forward.
I am all done with washed up, prune faced Pinay oracle Madam Auring.
No offense meant to the California Prune Growers Benevolent Association but a well-aged prune has less wrinkles than Madam A. She’s older than Bernard Hopkins or so I hear.
I’m betting all my quid on the signal from the squid.
Mayweather-Pacquiao happens on the chosen date of Nov. 13 because money and a lesser concern for legacy dictate that ?Money May? signs the bout contract.
Fallback position is early next year.
But Paul and I, we’re rolling with now and not with later.
We’re not squidding.
