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WBC president Jose Sulaiman called Filipino ring idol Manny Pacquiao Tuesday in an effort to salvage a possible super featherweight title fight with reigning champion Marco Antonio Barrera.
The overseas call from Mexico City demonstrated the WBC president’s keen interest in seeing the rematch between Pacquiao and Barrera take place in the midst of a legal battle between Oscar De La Hoya’s Golden Boy Promotions and Bob Arum’s Top Rank over who has the legal right to promote Pacquiao’s fights.
The lawsuit filed by Golden Boy against Top Rank for tortuous interference followed Pacquiao’s signing of a seven-fight contract in mid-September and Arum’s subsequent inking of a four-year deal with Pacquiao and Pacquiao’s recent announcement that his promoter was Arum.
As a result of the conflict between bitter rivals De La Hoya and Arum, a 50-50 offer initially made to Pacquiao by Golden Boy CEO Richard Schaefer was rejected by Top Rank with Arum making a counter-offer of $2.5 million to Barrera plus a percentage of pay-per-view revenues beyond a certain point. Pacquiao’s manager Shelly Finkel also entered the fray and said he would guarantee Pacquiao a minimum of $5 million to fight Barrera.
Schaefer said they didn’t have to respond to Arum’s offer since their contention was Top Rank was not the promoter of Pacquiao while Arum insisted that Finkel had signed a waiver last August and was no longer Pacquiao’s manager.
Sulaiman obviously stepped into the picture in the face of Golden Boy’s announced title clash between Barrera and Juan Manuel Marquez on March 17 at the MGM Grand in Las Vegas which the WBC is apparently reluctant to sanction since Pacquiao is the mandatory challenger. However, in the wake of the Golden Boy lawsuit and counter suit by Top Rank asking a Las Vegas court to decide on which promotional contract was valid and the absence of any ruling by the courts up to now, Sulaiman who called for a purse bid on January 12 called off the purse bid until the WBC itself because of the lawsuits.
Sulaiman has been challenged to strip Barrera of the title should he not defend it against Pacquiao but Sulaiman himself is not inclined to take such drastic action because Barrera wants the rematch in order to avenge his November 2003 demolition at the hands of the Filipino southpaw and its not his fault if the fight doesn’t push through but the fault of the contending promoters.
-From BS Main Page-
The overseas call from Mexico City demonstrated the WBC president’s keen interest in seeing the rematch between Pacquiao and Barrera take place in the midst of a legal battle between Oscar De La Hoya’s Golden Boy Promotions and Bob Arum’s Top Rank over who has the legal right to promote Pacquiao’s fights.
The lawsuit filed by Golden Boy against Top Rank for tortuous interference followed Pacquiao’s signing of a seven-fight contract in mid-September and Arum’s subsequent inking of a four-year deal with Pacquiao and Pacquiao’s recent announcement that his promoter was Arum.
As a result of the conflict between bitter rivals De La Hoya and Arum, a 50-50 offer initially made to Pacquiao by Golden Boy CEO Richard Schaefer was rejected by Top Rank with Arum making a counter-offer of $2.5 million to Barrera plus a percentage of pay-per-view revenues beyond a certain point. Pacquiao’s manager Shelly Finkel also entered the fray and said he would guarantee Pacquiao a minimum of $5 million to fight Barrera.
Schaefer said they didn’t have to respond to Arum’s offer since their contention was Top Rank was not the promoter of Pacquiao while Arum insisted that Finkel had signed a waiver last August and was no longer Pacquiao’s manager.
Sulaiman obviously stepped into the picture in the face of Golden Boy’s announced title clash between Barrera and Juan Manuel Marquez on March 17 at the MGM Grand in Las Vegas which the WBC is apparently reluctant to sanction since Pacquiao is the mandatory challenger. However, in the wake of the Golden Boy lawsuit and counter suit by Top Rank asking a Las Vegas court to decide on which promotional contract was valid and the absence of any ruling by the courts up to now, Sulaiman who called for a purse bid on January 12 called off the purse bid until the WBC itself because of the lawsuits.
Sulaiman has been challenged to strip Barrera of the title should he not defend it against Pacquiao but Sulaiman himself is not inclined to take such drastic action because Barrera wants the rematch in order to avenge his November 2003 demolition at the hands of the Filipino southpaw and its not his fault if the fight doesn’t push through but the fault of the contending promoters.
-From BS Main Page-
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