TOP RANK big boss Bob Arum revealed yesterday that Manny Pacquiao will earn much more than the combined earnings of Juan Manuel Marquez and Marco Antonio Barrera when the Filipino fights undefeated knockout artist Jorge Solis of Mexico on April 15 in San Antonio, Texas.
“Check with the Nevada State Athletic Commission and you’ll see that one fighter was paid $ 1.5 million and the other got $ 1.25 million,” Arum told the Bulletin in a long distance call from Los Angeles.
“Manny will earn much more than what these two fighters got combined,” said Arum shortly after arriving from Las Vegas. “Manny will get close to $ 5 million (about P250 million) against Solis.”
Arum also dismissed the plan of Golden Boy Promotions to file an injunction to stop the April 14 show from taking place saying it will not succeed.
“This is old news. We knew about this and we are not worried. Everything is going on smoothly,” said Arum, who is upbeat about his chances of getting a favorable ruling from the courts over the promotional rights over the GenSan lefty, regarded these days as the finest pound for pound fighter.
GBP, which is based in Los Angeles, and Top Rank, which operates from Las Vegas, are tangled in a legal tussle on who should have promotional rights over Pacquiao.
Arum said ABS-CBN may have a hand in efforts to seek an injunction to stop the Pacquiao-Solis scuffle dubbed “Blaze of Glory” at the Alamodome.
Arum said that because of its failure to snatch the TV rights, “ABS-CBN is resorting to tactics to sabotage the promotion.”
Solar Sports acquired the rights to Pacquiao’s fight after ABS-CBN reportedly found the broadcast rights to be too expensive.
Solar Sports would not reveal the amount it paid for the rights but it did not deny reports that it paid $ 800,000 (about P40 million ) to get Pacquiao’s approval.
Solar Sports will air the fight on GMA 7.
Pacquiao, in an interview yesterday, suspects that ABS-CBN may have something to do with the move to get an injunction to stop the fight from taking place, almost as much as Golden Boy is hell-bent in also having it scrapped.
“ABS-CBN ang may kagagawan nito,” Pacquiao told the Bulletin as he was relaxing at his apartment unit at the Palazzo in La Brea after racking up six rounds of sparring at the Wild Card in Hollywood.
Pacquiao, however did not say why he thought so.
Bong Osorio, who heads ABS-CBN’s PR department, denied the network has got something to do with plans to file an injunction.
“It’s a business decision,” said Osorio, noting that Pacquiao just opted to grant the TV rights to the Solar-GMA7 tieup.
“It’s that simple,” said Osorio.
Meanwhile, Arum said tickets are selling well for the Alamodome slugfest.
“There are over 10,000 tickets sold and we expect a sellout for this one,” said Arum. Noting that the cavernous venue that has a capacity of 60,000 will be configured to 20,000 for boxing.
But Pacquiao’s former chief handler, the New York-based Shelly Finkel, is not convinced that Pacquiao is doing the right thing.
“As I told you the court moves slowly, but in the end I believe GBP will win,” Finkel said in a short email yesterday.
“They probably can’t stop the Solis fight but who cares. They are talking a rematch for Marquez-Barrera and for Manny’s next opponent Soto. Look where Manny’s career has gone, both financially and star wise. Do you think he will wake up or is he that brainwashed?”
Meanwhile, a press conference will be held in Los Angeles and in neighboring San Diego on Wednesday (Thursday in the Philippines) to drum up the Pacquiao-Solis headliner.
Pacquiao and Solis are going to meet for the first time in this function. Also in attendance in the press affair are the other top attractions of the card led by Jorge Arce, Julio Cesar Chavez Jr. and Fil-Am Brian Viloria.
