As a famous Texas poet would say, “It’s back to the same thing.” I still don’t know what it means, but it fits many situations.
While Texan Jerry Jones has reserved November 6th and November 13th at his Cowboys Stadium for a Manny Pacquiao fight (Jones of course wants it to be against Floyd Mayweather) and promoter Bob Arum has reserved November 13th at the Las Vegas MGM Grand, this fight is still not close to being signed. But things could move swiftly once blood-doping is off the table.
The “same thing” is the stalemate we were at last December – January when Mayweather (through his entourage) said he wasn’t coming to Texas to fight.
I believe everybody was on cloud nine for Pacquiao’s election victory and all the comments made by people not known to be involved in any particular negotiations and calls for the “The Fight” by media that don’t regularly follow Pacquiao or boxing for that matter was just the fan and media base coming back down to earth from the election “high” they were all on. They simply felt they had to contribute and say something.
Trust me. Bob Arum is in charge and it’s all in good hands. It won’t be done five minutes earlier with any outside interference.
Whether it be because Texas doesn’t allow a pain killer to be used that Mayweather is fond of, or that he just wants the fight in his adoptive home of Las Vegas, Mayweather just might not want to come to Texas and he is willing fight in a smaller arena and has just enough ego that he’s not negotiable. If it’s a bluff, it’s about to be called.
Insulted, Pacquiao might say he’s not bending anymore on the anti-blood doping test.
An old Texas promoter once said about a fight that had lagging ticket sales,” If their not coming, you can’t stop them.” This is another Texas saying that makes no sense at all but I understand it completely.
Now that Mayweather has beaten Shane Mosley and doubled the PPV audience of Pacquiao over Joshua Clottey, he might want to come off of his 50-50 revenue split and desire more money. Anything is possible.
Respected journalist David Mayo of Mayweather’s original hometown newspaper, The Grand Rapids (MI) Press, who has covered Mayweather for years said as recently as today that Mayweather is simply not coming to Texas to fight.
“Mayweather has already has said he won’t fight Pacquiao in Dallas and that the fight won’t happen at all if the Filipino star doesn’t yield to his demand for random blood and urine drug testing.”
I have faith in the Pacquiao side that Arum will cut the best deal on behalf of his client. He must feel his fighter will be competitive or there would be no fight. This is not a minor point knowing the way Arum thinks.
Arum isn’t known for leaving a lot of money on the negotiating table and he gets his fighter a competitive advantage whenever and wherever he can.
The blood-doping is both the silliest and most important point that needs to be negotiated. Everything else should fall into place.
That famous Texas poet? Texas boxing co-ordinator Dickie Cole.
