I told you so. Three times I’ve gauranteed Floyd Mayweather will duck Manny Pacquiao. And Floyd has done it again. This time Floyd is demanding a 50-50 purse split which is simply not acceptable.
This is what Floyd always does when he knows he will very likely lose a fight to an iron-willed, relentless pressure fighter like Cotto, Williams, Margarito and Pacquiao: Floyd simply creates a host of excuses and reasons to block the fight he knows he could get beaten up and knocked out in. This time the ducking tactic is executed by pretending to want to force the fight to happen on the illogical date of May 5 as well as demanding the lion share of the total purse despite the fact Floyd is a fading PPV and live gate attraction and Pacquiao is a growing star who now exceeds the American’s star power, even in his own country.
If Pacquiao and Arum were to agree to these latest demands, Floyd will simply use another desperate demand to kill the fight, most likely, “Manny has to drop the lawsuit.” If Manny were to agree to drop the lawsuit, Floyd and his advisor Al Haymon would simply create yet another block. And on and on it would go. This is how they operate. Mayweather and Haymon do not want to fight Pacquiao and they never have. For two years Mayweather and Haymon have faked and schemed their way through this by pretending to want the fight but whenever it comes close to finalizing a deal they always find a way to block it.
How do I know this? Well, Al Haymon’s associate George Peterson, the co-manager of Paul Williams, told me so. “The fight will never happen,” an emphatic Peterson told me over and over again in December of 2009.
That’s right, it will never happen. Ducking Manny Pacquiao has been Mayweather and Haymon’s Plan A all along. Why? I’ll explain. Al Haymon has aspirations to run boxing in America. He said this to former HBO executive Xavier James, which published this information in The New York Times. Haymon can’t control boxing in the U.S. without a major star. The 35-year-old Mayweather is his only “star” and must be protected and coddled no matter what. Haymon is confident he can manipulate HBO and Golden Boy to give him whatever set up fights he wants for Floyd. Haymon is also confident the American public will buy more of Mayweather through Rcihard Schaefer’s and HBO’s marketing programs, even if most of the public realizes Mayweather is the one who ducked Pacquiao for two years.
Richard Schaefer is a known stooge of Haymon, as evidenced by his quote calling Haymon the smartest man he has never met. True power brokers in boxing do not admit subservience to any man. We know who’s thumb Richard Schaefer is under.
So by ducking Pacquiao, Haymon is making the smart business decision for Mayweather. With the marketing and shilling of Mayweather by the American media and HBO and Golden Boy, Haymon and Mayweather expect to continue to generate millions without having to take the big risk and cash out against Pacquiao. If Floyd loses to Pacquiao, it’s all over and Floyd, one of the ugliest and ill-behaved athletes in sports history, will be unsellable to the mainstream as a crossover star which is their agenda. Everything will be fine, they think, just as long as they duck Pacquiao. That is the key. Then Floyd and Haymon can control everything and choreograph their future “fights” Primo Carnera style.
The only hope for the biggest event in boxing history to happen will be if the American public says enough is enough and stops supporting Mayweather. Then Haymon and Mayweather will be forced to cash out. There must be a boycott by boxing fans to ignore all Mayweather “fights” until he boxes Manny Pacquiao. Or perhaps there is another hope. New HBO Sports boss Ken Hershmann, who has to be smart enough and caring enough for the integrity and future of the sport of boxing to know what the hell is going on here. Hopefully Hershmann will stand up to Haymon and physically kick his ass out of the building when Haymon tries to sell HBO on the next garbage WWE set up for Mayweather.
Boxing must cease heading in this direction of becoming an Al Haymon set up business “sport” like WWE wrestling of handpicked set up fights for Mayweather and the rest of his stable of boxers. Boxing must get back to the golden days of the best most noble gladiators competing againt the best, if it wants to thrive and flourish in the future once again, giving the fans what they want, not what “fights” the promoters want. Boxing must get back to the days of Muhammad Ali and Joe Louis and Jack Dempsey and Ray Leonard, who embraced the challenge of testing their skills against the best.
Manny Pacquiao vs. Floyd Mayweather is the Super Bowl event that can captivate and thrill the world, which can put boxing back on it’s feet and give it the boost of strength and momentum to advance into the future to another Golden era of glory and excitement.
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