Mendoza: Alas, in boxing, no plebiscite nor referendum
-A A +AAll Write
Saturday, September 22, 2012
I DO not like a fourth fight between Manny Pacquiao and Juan Manuel Marquez. There’s such a thing as too much of the good life. The two have had much of that already. They’ve earned millions in their first three fights. What more could they ask for?
A little of everything is the norm (balance); too much of everything is the narcotic (deadly).
But then, what I don’t like won’t matter.
What you don’t like, too, won’t matter.
Alas, there’s no plebiscite, referendum, in boxing.
The fans, they don’t have a voice; they can only cheer or jeer.
It’s the people in the business of boxing that does everything in the business of boxing.
So what Bob Arum, the biggest salesman in boxing since Don King, wants, he gets it. What he wants to sell, he closes the deal.
So does Manny Pacquiao. What he wants, he gets it. What he wants to sell, he doesn’t only reap the dividends; he rips it off, too.
Officially, the two have been “partners in crime” since 2006, after Pacquiao had knocked Erik Morales out in the third round in the third fight of their trilogy in Las Vegas. I was there when they signed their dollar-packed pact.
Since then, what Pacquiao and Arum had been doing to advance their interests in boxing, they’ve been enormously successful at it. Practically, it’s been basically an AP (Arum-Pacman) affair in boxing from ’06 till now.
And they intend to keep it that way, come hell or high water.
Why rock the boat when the sailing’s sweetly smooth?
So, draw or no draw, decision or no decision, knockout or no knockout on December 8, the Pacquiao-Marquez saga would live on and on and on.
Arum has set the premise: The Pacquiao-Marquez III in November had 1.25 million PPV (Par Per View) purchases against only 850,000 PPV buys in the Pacquiao-Bradley I in June this year.
So why gamble with another possible commercial flop with Bradley when there’s sure money, again, with Marquez?
We may detest its coming like the bubonic plague, but Arum and Pacquiao couldn’t care less.
At this stage, boxing’s Batman & Robin, if not Starsky & Hutch, are simply unbeatable.
Published in the Sun.Star Cebu newspaper on September 23, 2012.
Sports
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