Spence Wins Pacquiao Sweepstakes Over Crawford and Mikey Garcia
By Ralph Rimpell
PhilBoxing.com
Tue, 25 May 2021
Last Saturday on May 22, 2021 out of nowhere an official news media report announced that unified WBC/IBF welterweight champion Errol Spence, Jr (27-0, 21KOs) had reached an agreement to fight Future Boxing Hall of Famer Manny Pacquiao (62-7-2, 39KOs) on August 21, 2021 in Las Vegas.
This no doubt came as a surprise, maybe a shock, to four division world champion Mikey Garcia and former three division and current “Pound for Pound” WBO welterweight champion Terrence Crawford who were both reportedly in deep negotiations to fight Pacquiao which bore no fruit, meaning no agreement which meant no fight. What are the rumored reasons that caused both Crawford and Garcia to lose the lucrative “super fight” against Pacquiao? What are the rumored reasons why Spence was able to secure the coveted match with Pacquiao?
There is no doubt that in the minds of many boxing fans that the two best welterweights (147lbs) in the boxing world are Pacquiao and Crawford. Crawford is undefeated. When did Pacquiao honestly lose a fight? It was back in 2015 to Floyd Mayweather. The lone loss after Mayweather was a controversial one to Jeff Horn in 2017 that many observers thought Pacquiao should have been awarded the decision victory and retained his WBO welterweight crown. Since the disgrace of the Horn fight, Pacquiao has gone 3-0 against 3 former champions (Matthysse, Broner, Thurman) and won a version of the WBA title adding another world title to his trophy case. He is currently the WBA welterweight champion “in recess”.
Crawford is avoided by top welterweights. Crawford has reached a point where he needs a “super fight”. A fight that will cement his legacy and give him a nice multimillion dollar payday. Rumor has it that Crawford wanted 10 million dollars to fight Pacquiao in Dubai and a percentage of the Pay Per View (PPV) sales. It’s understandable why the Pacquiao camp reportedly passed on such financial demands. Whether that rumor is true or not, Crawford may have out priced himself out of negotiations.
Back in 1981 Thomas Hearns was the WBA champ at welterweight. No one wanted to fight him. Thomas Hearns reportedly took less money at the negotiation table to get WBC Welterweight Champion Sugar Ray Leonard to agree to fight him. Leonard-Hearns I was a great fight. That fight made Thomas Hearns a mainstream fighter. No one is suggesting that a fighter should accept an unreasonably low fight purse. However, Hearns left a nice template on how to get big fights signed by acquiescing to the star boxer, Sugar Ray Leonard. Subsequently, Hearns made a lot of money in the future against Duran and Hagler. Hearns set a good example for other fighters to learn from.
Mikey Garcia is a great fighter. He has already won 4 titles in as many divisions. There is no doubt that he is going to the boxing hall of fame when he retires. Garcia had the courage to challenge Errol Spence for a 5th title in 5 divisions but came up short. Garcia has coveted a fight with Pacquiao before the COVID 19 pandemic. Garcia had even gone on “Social Media” telling the boxing world that it was a “done deal” for match with Pacquiao. Perhaps a “done deal” was what was communicated to Garcia. This Writer thinks the best matchup was for Pacquiao to face Mikey Garcia. Garcia’s Mexican Heritage, the fact Garcia is bilingual (Speaks Fluent English and Spanish), and can fight is almost a given that worst case scenario was no less than 1 million PPV buys for a Pacquiao-Mikey Garcia fight. The question is what happened at negotiations for the Pacquiao fight. Did Garcia out price himself by asking for too much money as Crawford reportedly did? Did Garcia divulge too much of the fight negotiations to the public? Who knows? Only the Parties negotiating know why an agreement was not reached for Pacquiao-Garcia. Once again perhaps a lesson can be learned from the Thomas Hearn’s template on how to get big fights signed by acquiescing to the star boxer, Pacquiao, as did Thomas Hearns with Sugar Ray Leonard.
Errol Spence Jr is a major player in the welterweight division and holds the WBC/IBF championship belts. He fights for promotional outfit Premier Boxing Champions (PBC). Spence has a victory over Mikey Garcia. Spence, like Crawford and Garcia, also wanted a “super fight” and was even willing to move up in weight to challenge Canelo Alvarez. Spence is advised by influential boxing personality Al Haymon. The credit for securing this fight must be given to the Spence team and mostly Al Haymon. While this writer does not know the details of the Pacquiao-Spence negotiations, and more money is always better, it appears Haymon skillfully negotiated with the Pacquiao camp and got Spence a good financial deal. Most in the boxing world were not aware that Spence was also an option for Pacquiao. Give a lot of credit to PBC on how to keep a secret until it’s time to reveal it. Looks like the Spence camp followed the Thomas Hearns template on how to sign a “super fight”. A victory over Pacquiao by Spence could lead to more “super fights” at higher divisions, such as a Canelo fight because Spence will be exposed to the mainstream when he fights Pacquiao.
Pacquiao may be 42 years old and by the time he steps into the ring to face Spence he will have been inactive for 2 years. However, reports are that Pacquiao is not an ordinary 42-year-old fighter. Pacquiao still has his speed, reflexes, footwork, does not abuse his body, and stays in the gym. So, it’s not a foregone conclusion that Pacquiao will lose and pass the torch to the younger Spence in August. Either fighter can win the fight. For now, Spence must be congratulated for his perseverance after a horrible car accident, no doubt listening to his Advisors, and not yielding to fan pressure to take the Crawford fight, which he would likely have made less financially instead of fighting Pacquiao. This is all because of Spence’s patience. The saying is true that, “good things come to those who wait” as evidenced by Spence winning the Pacquiao sweepstakes over Crawford and Mikey Garcia.
Contact writer: RLuvsboxing@aol.com
***Ralph Rimpell is a writer based out of New York and is a Boxing Correspondent for Philboxing.com. Ralph holds an undergraduate degree from City University of New York. He has been a Boxing Writer for over ten years having written for several top boxing websites on the World Wide Web. Before becoming a writer, Ralph's passion was for professional wrestling until he realized professional wrestling was entertainment and not a real sport. It was at that time the 1984 US Olympic team made up of future stars such as Evander Holyfield, Meldrick Taylor, Pernell Whitaker, etc. entered the professional ranks and signed with promotional outfit Main Events.It was also at that time a young exciting Heavyweight originally hailing from Brooklyn named Mike Tyson also turned professional and became the face of boxing. Young boxing fan Ralph just couldn't get enough of boxing as a large part of it was being broadcast on "free TV". As time went on, Ralph felt boxing writers were not being forthcoming with their boxing coverage, opinion pieces, interviews, etc. So Ralph decided to write an article and submitted it to a Boxing website thinking it would be deleted and ignored by the Editor. To Ralph's surprise his article was posted on their website and the readers embraced it. The rest is history.
"I thank God for the Internet because it has created opportunities for writers like myself who likely would not have been given an opportunity to write for print publications. I hope someday soon to expand my role in Boxing on different levels." -- Ralph Rimpell
Click here to view a list of other articles written by Ralph Rimpell.
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