As much as everybody wanted it, the megabuck fight between arguably the top two boxers today is looking like it definitely won?t happen this year.
Perhaps, never will.
For the fight to happen this year, Floyd Mayweather Jr will have to sign the deal (virtually next to impossible) and pick a tune up fight before the US summer ends in order to be prepared against Manny Pacquiao in the fall.
With his mounting legal troubles, it is unlikely Floyd will fight in the first half of the year.
Floyd last fought in May last year.
He and his trainer Roger Mayweather, including his father, definitely won?t fight Pacquiao after more than a year and a half of layoff. Manny is no Juan Manuel Marquez whom Floyd toyed and totally outclassed in his comeback fight in 2009.
Manny can match Floyd?s speed (hands and feet).
Floyd won?t find a lumbering opponent in Manny like Marquez was. He won?t get the physical advantage that he had over Marquez, a natural lightweight who agreed to fight at the welterweight limit with Floyd. Manny will come in as big as and more active than Floyd if they will agree to fight each other towards the end of the year and that could spell trouble for the flamboyant and controversial American fighter.
That is why the consensus is that it ? The Fight ? won?t happen this year.
And it may no longer happen if the recent business moves of Top Rank?s Bob Arum, Pacquiao?s promoter, are to serve as indications.
Top Rank recently announced that the Manny Pacquiao-Shane Mosley fight in May will be on Showtime, a smaller rival of HBO.
Although Mayweather is technically a free agent, he deals with HBO through Golden Boy Promotions, a bitter rival of Top Rank.
HBO President Ross Greenburg had already tried bridging the gap between the two fighters? camps but couldn?t get the deal done, largely because of Mayweather?s refusal to fight Pacquiao.
Mayweather, according to Pacquiao man-Friday Michael Koncz, is just waiting to ambush Manny when the Filipino ring master slows down. But at 33 (Floyd turns 34 next month), Mayweather also faces father time. He may still be agile and quick when he turns 35 or 36 or in 2013 ? when Manny says it will be time for him to bid boxing goodbye. But so too will be a younger and still fresh Manny who will be just 33 by then.
And unless Manny suffers a devastating defeat between now and December 2013, Floyd won?t get to pick a ?shot fighter? in Pacquiao.
So unless some miracles really happen, the fight for the ages and possibly the biggest in the history of boxing will come down as the biggest disappointment in sports.
