By Mark Vester
At the recent fight week press conference for Antonio Margarito vs. Shane Mosley, Top Rank's Bob Arum touched on a possible future clash at the end of the year. Ever since trainer Freddie Roach announced that Manny Pacquiao was requesting a fight with Margarito, the possibility of such a fight has been the chatter of the boxing world. Roach told veteran scribe Ron Borges that Pacquiao was very confident of being able to outbox Margarito, who is much bigger and much stronger.
Should Margarito get past Mosley, he would then face Miguel Cotto in a June rematch. According to Arum, the winner of the Cotto-Margarito rematch would become a frontrunner to fight Pacquiao. All three fighters are under the Top Rank banner.
"Manny and [trainer] Freddie [Roach] are talking about challenging Margarito," Arum told The Los Angeles Times .
While Pacquiao has not really spoken on the subject of fighting Cotto, the Puerto Rican ex-champion had announced his willingness to take the fight in several interviews.
"If Manny Pacquiao is looking to fight a big name, I'm available," Cotto said to BoxingScene.com.
Pacquiao still has a very tough fight ahead of himself - a May 2 clash with Ricky Hatton at the MGM Grand in Las Vegas. Margarito said that he's heard about the tough talk from Pacquiao, but advised him to take care of Hatton first.
"I keep hearing that he wants to fight me and they [Pacquiao and Roach] say he can beat me. Let's see how well he does against Ricky Hatton at junior welterweight and then we can talk about a fight," Margarito said.
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