When it came to a potential May 5 showdown between Floyd Mayweather and Manny Pacquiao, you can forget about all the drama you heard about emails, phone calls, splits and purses, because it was never about any of that. For promoter Bob Arum, it's always been about the date and earlier today, he confirmed that fact with Lance Pugmire of the LA Times. "They don't want to fight in late May," Arum would explain of the Mayweather camp, reiterating the stance he's taken for the past two months that "there is no magic in May 5th" as far as he was concerned. "It's dead for May, so we should sit down with everybody, let Mayweather fight someone else May 5 and we'll fight someone else June 9, and then let's get a signed contract for [Mayweather-Pacquiao] in November. That's a win-win for everybody."
From the day that Mayweather Promotions CEO Leonard Ellerbe first announced the May 5 date, which Mayweather himself confirmed shortly after, Arum made it crystal clear that Manny Pacquiao would never be fighting on that date. When Ellerbe said they were hoping to make the fight with "the little fella", Arum was quick to claim that "the little fella" they were referring to was Erik Morales. In fact, just two days after Pacquiao's narrow victory over Marquez, Arum was already talking about the mega-fight taking place in November, stating, "That fight [Mayweather] can still be there for us in November [2012]...[Pacquiao] did not have the finish he wanted [vs. Marquez]." From then on, it was excuse after excuse after excuse as to why Mayweather vs. Pacquiao could not take place on May 5. First Manny needed more time for the cut over his eye to heal, then they needed to build a 40-seat outdoor stadium that wouldn't be completed until the end of May, and when all else failed, they went with the old standard...not enough time to promote the fight. From the get-go, Arum was never going to allow Manny Pacquiao to face Floyd Mayweather on May 5, and that fact couldn't have been made any clearer when he flat out said "absolutely not" when asked if Mayweather would be on the list of Manny's options when news broke of his surrender date being postponed.
The point is, those of you who were actually hoping that perhaps Bob Arum would finally make the fight you've been longing to see, you need to wake up and let go of that dream. In fact, I wouldn't even hold my breath for him to make any attempt to reach out to make the fight anytime soon. Sure, the notion of getting a signed contract for the fight to take place in November would be a great consolation prize, but that can only happen if Arum will actually sit down and negotiate the fight with the right people this time. Unfortunately, if he's still unwilling to work with retired federal judge Daniel Weinstein, as he was in November, then the fight is no closer to happening in November than it was on May 5. So after both fighters fight on May 5 and June 9 respectively, be prepared to go through another round of "negotiations", but expect the same outcome and start looking for a date in 2013 to mark your calendars.
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