World Boxing News gained a reaction to rumblings that Manny Pacquiao losing to Yordenis Ugas did low Pay Per View numbers for the legend’s last fight.
Pacquiao took the eighth defeat of his career at the hands of Cuban Ugas, who stepped in when Errol Spence Jr. pulled out with an eye injury days before.
Facing Spence would have certainly taken Pacquiao the half a million buys mark as sold for the previous Keith Thurman event in July 2019. But meeting Ugas did little to put the Filipino across a quarter-million marker.
Without giving an exact figure, Pacquiao’s former long-time promoter Bob Arum said his view of sales is not a good look for the Senator.
“Pacquiao’s never done, that I’m aware of, anything like how bad as he did for that fight,” Arum told WBN’s Dan Rafael when discussing the arrangements for a clash between Terence Crawford and Shawn Porter last week.
Arum’s words came as Premier Boxing Champions became more receptive to making a deal before the purse bid deadline later this month.
“He never did anything nearly as bad. That could be their thinking. I can’t read their mind,” he pointed out on whether the renewed interest was down to Pacquiao vs. Ugas numbers.
CRAWFORD vs. PORTER
Another theory from Arum was that Crawford vs. Porter would now head to ESPN due to PBC potentially securing the rights to Canelo vs. Caleb Plant.
“When they look at their situation, they have a tremendous amount that they’ve bet on the Canelo fight. To take on a burden like this, an additional burden is not easy.
“So, that may be one of the reasons why they may opt for us to do the event,” said Arum, before concluding on why there was an extension in the first place.
“We talked numbers before. I don’t think they’re just jerking around with this (extension). That doesn’t mean necessarily we make a deal, but certainly, there’s good faith.”
Matchroom boss Eddie Hearn is now sniffing around the welterweight world title bout to make a bid if nothing gets finalized by September 14th.
Arum will want everything done and dusted by then to avoid any scenario where DAZN would have a chance to steal the event.
MANNY PACQUIAO FUTURE
Regarding Manny Pacquiao and his future on the PPV platform, that’s up in the air at the moment. Whether he even fights against it is another story entirely.
At present, the “Pacman” is more focused on his political career. The race for the Presidency of the Philippines is hotting up for 2022.
