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Like Leonard-Hagler, A Mayweather- Pacquiao Clash Is Dominating the Industry
Not since Sugar Ray Leonard came out of retirement in 1987 to fight Marvin Halger have the plans of elite fighters in multiple divisions been swayed by one of the sport’s mega fights (Paquiao Mayweather).
In 1986 Tommy Hearns was eyeing a return match with Marvin Hagler at middleweight, but when Leonard surprisingly came out of retirement, Hearns was in a position similar to Shane Mosley, and was on the outside looking in.
At the time the top middleweight contenders were also waiting for the particulars of the dream fight to play themselves out because the Sugar-man wasn’t ranked since he had only fought once in a five year period so it was expected that Hagler would be stripped of his organizational titles, which had the world’s top ranked middleweights anticipating a possible showdown with Tommy Hearns for one of the vacant titles.
At the time it was viewed as a window of opportunity for ambitious Middleweights because Hagler had been undisputed middleweight champion since 1980 and hadn’t been active the last couple of years of his reign.
Hagler’s titles weren’t actually vacated until months after the fight with Leonard and the Hitman ended up moving-up two divisions to Light-heavyweight to win the WBC 175 title from Dennis Andries by tenth round knockout in a fight that happened a month before Leonard-Hagler.
Now Hearn’s inability to land a super-fight with either Hagler or Leonard had a number of fighters in the sport jockeying for a fight with the Hitman, but he chose the fight with Andries because it helped him mover closer to his goal of becoming boxing’s first four division champion, which occurred when he beat Juan Roldan for Hagler’s vacant WBA middleweight title in the fall of 1987.
Now today just like in 1986, a number of fighters are being held captive by another super-fight, the Mayweather-Pacquiao showdown, and are waiting to see how this mega-bout plays itself out. Will Mayweather sign to fight somebody else before the Pacquiao-Cotto clash? And if he does then whom? Will Pacquiao or Mayweather take a fight with Mosley instead of fighting each other? If Mosley doesn’t fight Andre Berto, who will he fight? And if Berto fights Mosley will Luis Collazo be allowed to fight the next leading available contender for the vacant WBC 147 pound title?
Even though a Mayweather-Pacquiao bout isn’t even in the preliminary stages of negotiations and Pacquiao has a very dangerous fight coming up against Cotto, the proposed dream bout between Pacquiao and Mayweather is a driving force in the industry and has insiders and the public abuzz.
Unfortunately for Shane Mosley, he is the Tommy Hearns of this contemporary setting and is still hoping that a bout with Mayweather comes to fruition while he mules over more tangible options. His father and trainer, Jack Mosley, thinks Shane should still try to publicly pressure Mayweather into the fight, “Shane has the money, he needs to do some PR work. A closed mouth doesn’t get fed,” commented Jack Mosley.
Since Mosley is 38 years old and has not fought in ten months he is eager to lace them up around the New Year and has to look at a number of other options and Andre Berto is the leading candidate.
It’s been reported that Berto’s people aren’t happy with the money that’s been offered so they are also looking at their options. Luis Collazo is the mandatory contender for Berto’s WBC belt and a mandated purse bid for the fight was recently postponed. Berto-Collazo II is appealing because the first fight was a fight of the year candidate. Also there have been musings on the internet that Showtime has shown some interest in a clash between WBC welterweight champion Andre Berto and WBO 140 pound champion Timothy Bradley, but Alex Camponovo, the general manager of Thompson boxing, Bradley’s co-promoter, recently stated in an interview with fightfannation.com that, “Those have only been rumblings. I wouldn’t hesitate in putting Timothy in there with Berto,but we have a big fight with Lamon Peterson coming up in December.”
Just like with Hagler-Leonard, the potential super fight between Mayweather and Pacquiao isn’t just dominating the minds of boxing fans around the world; it’s dominating the sport.
http://www.fightfannation.com/captive101109.html
In 1986 Tommy Hearns was eyeing a return match with Marvin Hagler at middleweight, but when Leonard surprisingly came out of retirement, Hearns was in a position similar to Shane Mosley, and was on the outside looking in.
At the time the top middleweight contenders were also waiting for the particulars of the dream fight to play themselves out because the Sugar-man wasn’t ranked since he had only fought once in a five year period so it was expected that Hagler would be stripped of his organizational titles, which had the world’s top ranked middleweights anticipating a possible showdown with Tommy Hearns for one of the vacant titles.
At the time it was viewed as a window of opportunity for ambitious Middleweights because Hagler had been undisputed middleweight champion since 1980 and hadn’t been active the last couple of years of his reign.
Hagler’s titles weren’t actually vacated until months after the fight with Leonard and the Hitman ended up moving-up two divisions to Light-heavyweight to win the WBC 175 title from Dennis Andries by tenth round knockout in a fight that happened a month before Leonard-Hagler.
Now Hearn’s inability to land a super-fight with either Hagler or Leonard had a number of fighters in the sport jockeying for a fight with the Hitman, but he chose the fight with Andries because it helped him mover closer to his goal of becoming boxing’s first four division champion, which occurred when he beat Juan Roldan for Hagler’s vacant WBA middleweight title in the fall of 1987.
Now today just like in 1986, a number of fighters are being held captive by another super-fight, the Mayweather-Pacquiao showdown, and are waiting to see how this mega-bout plays itself out. Will Mayweather sign to fight somebody else before the Pacquiao-Cotto clash? And if he does then whom? Will Pacquiao or Mayweather take a fight with Mosley instead of fighting each other? If Mosley doesn’t fight Andre Berto, who will he fight? And if Berto fights Mosley will Luis Collazo be allowed to fight the next leading available contender for the vacant WBC 147 pound title?
Even though a Mayweather-Pacquiao bout isn’t even in the preliminary stages of negotiations and Pacquiao has a very dangerous fight coming up against Cotto, the proposed dream bout between Pacquiao and Mayweather is a driving force in the industry and has insiders and the public abuzz.
Unfortunately for Shane Mosley, he is the Tommy Hearns of this contemporary setting and is still hoping that a bout with Mayweather comes to fruition while he mules over more tangible options. His father and trainer, Jack Mosley, thinks Shane should still try to publicly pressure Mayweather into the fight, “Shane has the money, he needs to do some PR work. A closed mouth doesn’t get fed,” commented Jack Mosley.
Since Mosley is 38 years old and has not fought in ten months he is eager to lace them up around the New Year and has to look at a number of other options and Andre Berto is the leading candidate.
It’s been reported that Berto’s people aren’t happy with the money that’s been offered so they are also looking at their options. Luis Collazo is the mandatory contender for Berto’s WBC belt and a mandated purse bid for the fight was recently postponed. Berto-Collazo II is appealing because the first fight was a fight of the year candidate. Also there have been musings on the internet that Showtime has shown some interest in a clash between WBC welterweight champion Andre Berto and WBO 140 pound champion Timothy Bradley, but Alex Camponovo, the general manager of Thompson boxing, Bradley’s co-promoter, recently stated in an interview with fightfannation.com that, “Those have only been rumblings. I wouldn’t hesitate in putting Timothy in there with Berto,but we have a big fight with Lamon Peterson coming up in December.”
Just like with Hagler-Leonard, the potential super fight between Mayweather and Pacquiao isn’t just dominating the minds of boxing fans around the world; it’s dominating the sport.
http://www.fightfannation.com/captive101109.html