Promoter Bob Arum is in negotiations to pit his fighter WBO welterweight champion Terence ‘Bud’ Crawford 37-0 (28) against WBA 147-pound champion Manny ‘Pac Man’ Pacquiao 62-7-2 (39) in the Middle East.
If the fight doesn’t come to fruition, Arum has a backup plan that would see former WBC and IBF champion Shawn ‘Showtime’ Porter 31-3-1 (17) lock horns with the 33-year-old Crawford instead.
Southpaw Pacquiao, 42, has not fought since scoring a 12-round split decision win against Keith Thurman 29-1 (22) in Las Vegas in July 2019.
“The Pacquiao group is working with people in the Middle East, who are real people and that are going to finance this,” the Top Rank chairman said to Boxing Social.
“If they come up with the money and finance this fight, then we’ll do the fight in this country in the Middle East.
“Top Rank would be used by the country to work all the details of the promotion and all that type of thing, but the people in the country would be the actual promoters of the fight and it would be a big opportunity for Terence Crawford to fight Manny Pacquiao.
“If that doesn’t come to fruition, then I will continue my talks with Shawn Porter and hope to do Terence against Shawn Porter.
“Either of them in my opinion is interesting fights. But obviously, Pacquiao is Pacquiao and if Pacquiao can get into the ring with Crawford, obviously that’s the way Terence would want to go.”
Another fight Arum is keen to make is former pound-for-pound king Vasiliy Lomachenko 14-2 (10) against Devin ‘The Dream’ Haney 25-0 (15) in the northern summer.
“Absolutely, there’s no question about it,” Arum said.
“That would be a really good fight and a good test for both guys. I think it would be very, very popular and we would do it depending on the rest of the schedule in either July or the beginning of August.”
