By Ronnie Nathanielsz

THE wave of media interest in Filipino boxing hero Manny Pacquiao continues to soar.

Top Rank promoter Bob Arum informed BoxingScene.com, insidesports.ph, Standard Today and Viva Sports that TIME magazine sent him an e-mail on Wednesday in Las Vegas, indicating its request for an interview with Pacquiao. The magazine told Arum it is doing a huge feature on the Pacman prior to his next fight.

“This is not just sports. This is the biggest selling magazine in the United States,” said Arum. “Everybody wants to see him, everybody is talking about him so he can be very, very careful and very choosy about who his opponent is. Pacquiao doesn’t have to give away a lot of money to his opponent because he is the attraction.”

Talking about a possible showdown with former pound-for-pound no. 1 Floyd Mayweather Jr., Arum insisted Pacquiao is the attraction. He previously told Standard Today that the most Mayweather Jr. would get is 35 percent to Pacquiao’s 65 percent.

Arum was also clearly peeved at the decision by Golden Boy Promotions to hold a press conference to announce the Mayweather Jr.- Juan Manuel Marquez fight hours before the Pacquiao-Ricky Hatton showdown at the MGM Grand in Las Vegas.

“They tried to steal some publicity and we are not going to forget about that,” said Arum, pointing out that they could have held the press conference after the May 2 fight.

Arum said Oscar de la Hoya was co-promoting the Pacquiao-Hatton fight and posed the question—“how can he demean that? It was nuts what they did. Everybody is talking about it. But they are amateurs, not professionals.”

Arum jokingly suggested that they would have a press conference before the Mayweather Jr.- Marquez fight, “announcing anything.”