By Lem Satterfield
Michael Koncz, adviser for WBO 147-pound king Manny Pacquiao, agrees with Top Rank's CEO Bob Arum, who felt the proposal submitted on behalf of Juan Manuel Marquez has overpriced the Mexican boxer. Arum has set aside April 16 at the MGM Grand in Las Vegas for Pacquiao's next fight. Koncz still considers Shane Mosley the frontrunner to fight Pacquiao in April. Marquez and WBC welterweight champion Andre Berto are the other two candidates being considered.
"I felt that, even without directly having seen the proposals from Golden Boy that the numbers that Marquez was asking for were too high," Koncz said. "What happened with Marquez coming to the Philippines what was it, two years ago? It was something like that where he insulted Manny and called him out at an event, challenging him to a boxing match and saying that he would fight him for a million dollars or less than a million dollars. What happened to that attitude?"
According to Koncz, Marquez is not a big enough draw, or a big enough name, to demand the kind of money defined in his proposal. Marquez's pay-per-view bout with Floyd Mayweather Jr. sold over 1 million units in September 2009. Koncz attributes 80-90% of those buys to Mayweather.
"If you take Marquez's pay per view numbers, well, other than Mayweather, you can do your own math. We know Manny's the draw. Marquez brings a little bit to the table, but definitely, nothing like Shane Mosley will, or like Margarito did. Marquez never has had a fan base, and I still don't think that he has a fan base. And he never will have a fan base. The numbers with the Mayweather fight, you can attribute 80 to 90 percent of those numbers to Mayweather," Koncz said.
"As far as I'm concerned, what Golden Boy paid Marquez to fight Mayweather, which was an in-house promotion, that's their business. Manny's at a point in his career now where we don't have to give in to unrealistic demands."
Lem Satterfield is the boxing editor at AOL FanHouse and the news editor at BoxingScene.com. To read more from Lem Satterfield, go to AOL FanHouse by Clicking Here.
