A solid source inside Team Floyd Mayweather has just informed me that Money May is balking at fighting Sugar Shane Mosley and that is the reason for the holdup on the announcement of a May 1 or a May 8 bout between the two American ring stars.
“Floyd did the math and Floyd is saying, why should I take a potentially difficult bout against Mosley for $10 million or less when I get $40 million or more to fight Manny Pacquiao and that could be an easier fight to win,” the in the know person said Saturday night.
The source said that a heavy internal discussion and debate is going on in the Mayweather camp as to whether Floyd’s best bet might to be stay on the sidelines and let Pacman get past Joshua Clottey on March 13. Then the Mayweather camp could try to restart the previously failed negotiations to make the Mayweather-Pacquiao mega bout.
“Mosley does ok, just ok, on the PPV against Mayweather,” an HBO source said. “Whereas, Manny and Floyd can break all the records and do something approaching three million buys on PPV. Upside on Manny and Floyd, which is the hottest attraction to the public, is unbelievable while upside of Shane and Floyd is limited.”
Meanwhile, the always cagey Pacman promoter Bob Arum is already making his contingency plans beyond the March 13 Clottey bout at Cowboys Stadium in Arlington where reportedly 20,000 tickets were sold on the first day of general ticket sales (Saturday).
Someone familiar with Arum’s thinking and strategy said the head of Top Rank is making moves to line returning from suspension Mexican Antonio Margarito a viable post-Clottey foe for Pacman.
“Margarito will begin training on Monday in Oxnard, CA., with his new trainer, former world champion Robert Garcia. Garcia is headed back from the Philippines where his world champ Brian Viloria lost his title in Manila,” this source said.
Margarito will fight some “tomato can” opponent on the Clottey-Pacquiao undercard, his first fight since losing to Mosley last Jan. 24 in Los Angeles.
“Arum figures all is forgiven by the public once Margarito is back in the win column. Then in the wake of having 40,000, maybe 50,000 in the Cowboys Stadium for Manny against Clottey, he sells Jerry Jones a second Manny bout, a natural against the Mexican Margarito. That fills up Manny’s fistic calendar for 2010 and Floyd and Manny is bigget than ever for 2011,” this insider said.
“If nothing else, Arum will shrewdly use Margarito-Pacquiao as a diversion to get Mayweather to agree to less money, less drug testing, less everything so he can cash in against Manny,” the insider said.
In the meantime, should Manny-Floyd come to fruition, Arum can pacifty Margarito with a still red hot all Latin revenge bout, Miguel Cotto against Margarito.
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