Does Pacquiao want it?

For two years, the biggest impediment to a Floyd Mayweather-Manny Pacquiao fight was Bob Arum's reluctance to make it.

Today, it is Pacquiao's failure to take control of his own career, and to tell Arum, his promoter, what's in his heart -- if, in fact, the desire for a Mayweather fight burns there.

Arum planned to fly to The Philippines today to present four potential opponents to Pacquiao, none of them Mayweather.

The first word out of Pacquiao's mouth should be, "Why?"

The machinations of power, money and influence converged upon a Las Vegas courtroom Friday. Mayweather was supposed to go to jail for 87 days, more or less, in a domestic incident. But his attorneys filed a last-ditch motion to delay it, based on pre-existing contractual obligations for a May 5 fight in that same city.

Maybe that shouldn't matter. But it does. Casinos are to Las Vegas what cars are to Detroit. A big fight draws big action. And no fight is bigger than one with Mayweather on the marquee.

The judge said she didn't know about such plans when she pronounced sentence. Seems she's not much of a boxing fan, which is forgiven, but that May 5 date had been public knowledge for a couple of months by the time of last month's sentencing. Mayweather's attorneys argued that the unique design of the boxing business, and the many commitments of resources by some power-hitters in the casino industry that dominates that desert landscape, should allow the Grand Rapids boxing star to delay his jail sentence until June 1, so he could ply his trade.

The judge agreed.

Simply put, an American court willingly delayed the full application of justice to avoid becoming an obstacle to a Mayweather-Pacquiao fight. Frame it however you want, that's what happened.

Except Arum said it won't happen anyway, and that he'll propose the same four potential opponents to Pacquiao as previously identified, Miguel Cotto (whom Pacquiao already defeated), Juan Manuel Marquez (against whom Pacquiao is 2-0-1 in three rugged, disputed fights), and Lamont Peterson and Tim Bradley (good fighters who, all due respect, no one outside their families wants to see fighting Mayweather or Pacquiao next).

All the public wants is one fight.

One man stands in its way -- and it's not Bob Arum anymore.

Oh, for a long time it was. Arum was the very first person to pull the plug on Mayweather-Pacquiao, way back in December 2009, when Mayweather demanded Olympic-style drug testing, and the promoter declared that the fight never would happen. And then, in one of the most brilliant promotional jobs of his Hall of Fame career, Arum completely bamboozled the public at-large into thinking Mayweather was the balky one.

The drug testing was Mayweather's fault. The defamation lawsuit Pacquiao filed, alleging Mayweather falsely accused him of steroid use, was Mayweather's fault. Going to jail was Mayweather's fault.

Arum sold every point and leveraged each one as a reason to not make a boxing match, when making boxing matches is what he has done for nearly five decades, as if any one of those reasons was enough not to make Mayweather-Pacquiao.

In fact, they weren't even reason enough collectively, as we now know, since even incarceration couldn't stand in the way of Mayweather-Pacquiao.

Only promotional reluctance did.

But the public tone has changed. The Mayweather side's repeated calls for the Pacquiao fight chipped away at the foundation of the who's-avoiding-whom debate, which Arum so artfully crafted in Pacquiao's favor. And now, with the last barrier stripped away, Arum said he still won't pursue the fight, which stripped away any lingering doubt about why Mayweather-Pacquiao hasn't already happened. It was Bob Arum.

But that disclosure also freed Arum. It purged him. It shifted the onus away from him.

It shifted that burden to Pacquiao instead.

I don't know how this conversation goes this week, or how Arum approaches Pacquiao with a list of four potential opponents, none of them Mayweather. But if you're Pacquiao, with the other key obstacles eliminated, wouldn't you wonder why your own promoter never mentioned the only fight anyone really craves?

Wouldn't you wonder if he feared you would lose?

Wouldn't you ask?

And wouldn't you like to hear Arum answer that one, openly and honestly, if in fact he could look Pacquiao in the eye and say, "I don't think he's right for you."

Arum said Pacquiao, who was cut in a November fight, will be healed in time to fight in June, not May. It was a deep cut, granted. But that's really the nit we're picking here?

These guys are out of Plan B options, as evidenced by Arum's list and the likelihood that Mayweather will end up facing someone such as Saul "Canelo" Alvarez, who is a promising young champion but too green for such an event.

Friday's court action opened a window for Mayweather-Pacquiao in May. It also closed the window for the rest of the year, which means the fight won't happen until 2013 -- if at all.

Arum knows that. He'll exploit it.

It's up to Manny Pacquiao to ask all the pertinent questions that a champion should ask about why the most historic fight of this era isn't being made, during a rare period when boxing's only two megastars fight in the same weight division.

Then, it's up to Pacquiao to tell Arum to make the fight anyway.

If he doesn't, we have our real answer as to who doesn't want it.


[url]http://www.mlive.com/mayweather/index.ssf/2012/01/if_manny_pacquiao_doesnt_deman.html?[/url]

 

So Pacquiao would rather fight in the courtroom than in the ring?

If he wanted it then make it happen, if he has to drop the lawsuit then do it, if he has to put pressure on Arum to make it happen then that is exactly what he should be doing.

Instead he's sitting back and letting Arum call the shots, the reason for that is because he's happy to avoid Mayweather and fight a lightweight champion yet again at welterweight.