Manny Pacquiao is negotiating with Errol Spence Jr for a fight in July on pay-per-view in the United States. Pacquiao (62-7-2, 39 KOs) has moved on from his negotiations with his plans for a June 5th fight against WBO 147-lb champion Terence Crawford after the investors in the UAE failed to produce the money, according to Mike Coppinger.
Pacquiao is rumored to have wanted a massive amount of money for the Crawford fight. Whether the Filipino star can get a big enough purse to sign to fight Spence (27-0, 21 KOs) is the big question.
If the $40 million that Pacquiao was rumored to be asking for to fight Crawford is true, that could be an obstacle to making the Spence fight. Is there a promoter that is willing to put up that kind of money during the pandemic?
We’ll have to see if there’s enough money on the PBC side to motivate the 42-year-old Pacquiao to sign to fight Spence.
Things could be made easier if one of the overseas countries paid a massive site fee to bring Pacquiao and Spence over there.
There would likely be enough money for the former eight-division world champion Pacquiao to agree to the deal, but that may not happen. Pacquiao vs. Spence isn’t on the same level as the heavyweight clash between Anthony Joshua and Tyson Fury.
It’s been musical chairs lately for Pacquiao, with Crawford, Ryan Garcia, and Mikey Garcia ll being mentioned as potential options for the Filipino star. None of those fights have happened, which is why boxing fans are highly doubtful that the Pacquiao-Spence fight will take place.
It’s difficult to know why it’s become so difficult to put a fight together with Pacquiao. Is he asking for too much money at this point in his career, or is he having a hard time deciding on he wants to fight?
Years ago, Pacquiao was incredibly popular, but his loss to Floyd Mayweather Jr in 2015 has arguably led to a decrease in his popularity. It hasn’t helped that Pacquiao has only had one big high-profile fight against Keith Thurman in the last six years. The rest of Pacquiao’s fights since 2015 have been lackluster match-ups against these fighters:
- Timothy Bradley
- Jessie Vargas
- Adrien Broner
- Lucas Matthysse
- Jeff Horn
In hindsight, Pacquiao might have hurt his popularity by fighting these guys instead of the matches that the boxing world wanted to see.
Although Pacquiao did take on Thurman two years ago, he took that fight a couple of years too late. Thurman was already a faded fighter by the time Pacquiao chose to fight him. If Manny had fought Thurman in 2016 or 2017, it would have been a bigger deal.
Spence is the end of the line for Pacquiao as far as popular welterweights go that he can make money fighting.
There is Mikey Garcia as an option for Pacquiao if the Spence fight fails to happen, but he’s not a legitimate welterweight, and he’s done nothing with his career since 2018.
