HBO Boxing sportscaster Jim Lampley joined The Rich Eisen Show today to reflect on Floyd Mayweather vs. Manny Pacquiao three days after. Lampley felt remorse for those then spent money attending the fight and those who pay-per-viewed it. He also explains that while it can be seen as noble for Pacquiao to fight with an injured shoulder, he in fact did a disservice boxing and the audience. Lampley is not in favor of rematch.
After suffered a twelve round decision loss, Pacquiao and his promoter, Bob Arum of Top Rank, revealed the boxer had entered the fight with a right shoulder injury.
"Well, I think a lot less of it now [with respect to the fight]...look, it was a cynical enterprise to begin with in certain ways and now seems even moreso…I feel terrible for who spent 4 figures on a ticket, I feel bad for people who spent 89--90--100 dollars on pay-per-view who were not given proper information in advance on what it was they were seeing," Lampley said.
"I think there may be a consituency of people who think it’s in some way noble and brave for Pacquiao to go ahead and enter the ring with an injury and try to perform, but I think that the only way that that would wash is if the public had known in advance.
"And to have gone ahead with the enterprise when one of the fighters turns out to be damaged goods. And for all of the advertising and promotions to have continued to base itself on the notion that this was the fight of the century and the best combat that boxing could offer to fans and unitiated fans who only know a little bit about boxing and see it from the surface level buy in at the level in which they bought in are bound to feel somewhat cheated today."
"I just really think it’s highly unfortunate for our sport, I think it’s bad for Pacquiao’s image and taints his great and noble career, and I could go on and on about the ways in which this is unfortunate for boxing and for the audience…I can’t imagine, even under these circumstances, that a rematch would illicit anything other than an embararssing response compared to what they got the other night."
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