The Floyd Mayweather Jr.-Manny Pacquiao fight took more than five years to get off the ground. It might have lost some luster over time, but it remains as fascinating as ever.
The clash at MGM Grand in Las Vegas on May 2 will be between two contrasting personalities.
Off the ring, Pacquiao is the meek, polite and evangelical type. Mayweather is the brash, bad boy known as “Money” for flaunting his cash, private jet and expensive cars.
For this sort of behavioral conflict, the match had fallen apart since late 2009.
But now that it’s finally on, the Mayweather-Pacquiao tiff has retained its grip on legions of boxing fans because of the prevailing notion that the two supernovas could have collided when they were younger.
Some of the ring’s greatest world championships outside of the heavyweight division were fought by fighters in their prime.
Sugar Ray Leonard was 24 and Roberto Duran was 29 at the time of their controversial “no mas” (no more) welterweight fight at the Superdome in Louisiana on Nov. 25, 1980.
Aaron Pryor was 27 when he defeated Alexis Arguello, then 30, in the brutal “battle of champions” world junior welterweight encounter at the Orange Bowl in Miami on Nov. 18, 1982.
Mayweather (47-0, 26 knockouts) just turned 38. Pacquiao (57-5-2, 38 K0s) is 36.
Their ages add up to 74, which is about 174 years for the rabid ring faithful who waited this long for the fight to happen.
With tremendous fan anticipation, Mayweather-Pacquiao is hoped to gross up to $300 million (P13.2 billion) and is a sure bet to become the most lucrative in ring history.
The unification welterweight clash is expected to shatter previous pay-per-view and live-gate records.
Ringside seats were reported to have cost from $1,250 to upwards of $6,000 before a thriving black market takes over.
The PPV price is expected to be $100 a pop.
With such stiff prices, the pressure is building for both fighters to perform and thrill their worldwide audience.
It will be interesting to see how five-division world champ Mayweather and Filipino ring icon and folk hero Pacquiao, the world’s only eight-division title holder, would fend off criticism that Father Time has grabbed the protagonists by the neck.
To quash talk of two museum-ready pieces on exhibit at MGM Grand depends on each’s boxer’s agenda and mindset come fight time.
It will be up to both fighters to justify the hype, that they have tried hard to remain in peak form, that their skills and punching power have not been dulled much by the years.
Money is a slight favorite to win. Vegas sports books said up to $50 million will be legally bet on the fight.
So will Mayweather present himself as the same defense-oriented perpetual-motion machine who could digress at every chance to engage Pacquiao?
Will the Pacman stick to his style as a rapid-firing, in-your-face boxer with the fancy footwork?
Stick around on May 2 for the answer.
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London’s Daily Mail reports that Bob Arum, Pacquiao’s promoter, is expecting 4 to 5 million PPV buys that would help make the $300 million purse a reality.
If Arum’s projections hold true, the purse split will be $180 million to Mayweather and $120 million to Pacquiao under their 60-40 percent arrangement.