By Edward Chaykovsky
Adam Smith, Head of Boxing for Sky Sports, is hoping that Floyd Mayweather Jr. gives in to the public pressure by taking a fight with Manny Pacquiao on May 2nd at the MGM Grand in Las Vegas.
Their respective camps have been in talks for weeks, hoping to finalize a deal. Hopes were further raised on Tuesday night, when Mayweather and Pacquiao spoke to face to face and exchanged numbers at a basketball game in Miami, Florida.
"[Mayweather] is still the money man. He is still the king of boxing at the moment. He's unbeaten and he's the best and you can't take that away from him. He doesn't knock everybody out. He's not everyone's cup of tea. His attitude if not everyone's cup of tea. But I think Floyd Mayweather has been phenomenal for boxing. I don't think he owes anybody anything," Smith told BoxingScene.com/Be Real Boxing.
"Sometimes you get to a position where you can't pick and choose. But I also think that if he does retire without fighting Pacquiao, it will always be said that he didn't take that [fight]. With Carl Froch and George Groves. I don't think deep down that Carl desperately deep down wanted to go through that again. But he did."
"And I think that if [Froch] hadn't fought George Groves again, he would have retired always thinking 'why didn't you fight him.' There was a lot of public pressure on that and Carl took the fight. I hope Mayweather will take the Pacquiao fight and bow to public pressure. I think he will be remembered as more of a great by taking the fight than if he doesn't."
