By Edward Chaykovsky
Top Rank's CEO Bob Arum met with eight division world champion Manny Pacquiao on Monday night and two of them discussed some possibilities for what is likely going to be the final fight of Manny's career.
Pacquiao, who is currently a congressman in the Philippines, plans to pursue a senate seat in 2016 and his chances of winning are very good.
Both Pacquiao and Arum agree that a senate position would effectively close the door on being an active fighter.
“He can’t [mess] around and take off to go into a training camp for three months if he’s in office as a senator,” Arum told the Los Angeles Times. “Senators do most of the work in the Philippines. They have to be there virtually every day. He knows if he’s a senator, he can’t fight.”
Arum says Pacquiao's last fight will take place no later than April 9th. Some of the possible opponents include Terence Crawford, Timothy Bradley (if he beats Brandon Rios), Viktor Postol, Amir Khan and a few others are being kicked around.
In a recent interview, Pacquiao called for a rematch with Floyd Mayweather Jr., who beat the Filipino star on May 2nd by way of a twelve round unanimous decision.
Mayweather announced his retirement last month after beating Andre Berto.
“If you ask me, of course, I want a rematch,” Pacquiao said. “I heard that he retired already. If he really retired, then there’s no rematch. But if not...”
With such a short time schedule to put together Pacquiao's next fight, and Mayweather's insistence of being retired for good, Arum advised his fighter to mentally turn the page on getting Mayweather back in the ring again.
“He would like to fight Mayweather, but since this is his last fight, and looking at where we are on time, I told him he needs to forget about it and move on,” Arum said.
