Bob Arum unofficially gives Mayweather until mid-December to take up Pacquiao fight
According to Top Rank CEO Bob Arum, serious discussions to determine Manny Pacquiao’s next opponent will not occur until mid-December, boxingscene.com reports.
Arum, who is planning to head to the Philippines then for Pacquiao’s 32nd birthday, said it would be the right time to resume talks with the caveat that Floyd Mayweather Jr. is still the top dog for “Pacman.”
In recent weeks Arum spoke to both “Sugar” Shane Mosley and WBC welterweight king Andre Berto about the possibility of facing Pacquiao next, with nothing set in stone.
Mayweather, on the other hand, appears to have all but disappeared from boxing, following documented legal troubles and the continued success of Pacquiao, in which “Pretty Boy Floyd” is suspected to have some interest.
Mayweather didn’t even make a peep when Ring Magazine, the “Bible of Boxing,” dethroned him from the No.1 welterweight slot last week and gave it to Pacquiao following a masterful performance over Antonio Margarito.
But Arum won’t take silence as an answer.
He told boxingscene.com: “I'm still hoping that Floyd Mayweather surfaces so that we can make that fight. I'm still hoping for that. I mean, that's still our No. 1 priority. But if that won't happen, then, as we get closer to my date of departure, which
is Dec. 12, then we will explore Shane Mosley, and Andre Berto, and, maybe even Juan Manuel Marquez. Anybody like that would make an attractive fight."
The comments came just as Golden Boy CEO Richard Schaefer had finished implying that Arum had hand-picked Pacquiao’s opponents to insure his success in the ring.
Schaefer told the popular boxing site FanHouse Pacquiao himself doesn’t consider whom he fights, he merely does the fighting. So that if anyone has issues with the quality of Pacquiao’s opponents, one should be “disappointed” with Arum and not “Pacman”
himself.
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