By Ryan Burton
 
On Thursday, BoxingScene.com ran a story where junior middleweight contender Alfredo "El Perro" Angulo explained why he rejected an offer of $750,000 dollars to fight WBC middleweight champion Sergio Martinez. Angulo explained to me that he thought he could negotiate for a little more money. He also didn't think it was right that Martinez was going to get a percentage of the gate. Angulo felt he should be getting a percentage himself since he would be drawing most of the fans in a heavily Mexican populated area like Los Angeles where he believed the fight would be held.

Angulo's promoter, Gary Shaw, and manager Mike Criscio, read the story and wanted to comment on it. Shaw for one wasn't sure who told Perro that the fight might be at Staples Center. 

Shaw said - "I don't know who is talking to Perro, but I want to set the record straight.  First I never mentioned Staples (Center) to Perro. If anywhere, I believe Lou DiBella would have looked at the Nokia Theatre (next door to Staples Center)." 
 
Shaw believes that someone on the outside was giving Angulo bad advice and that he had no knowledge of Martinez's end of the deal.

"I have no idea what Sergio's deal was, never asked, so I don't know how Perro knows that. Sergio is a partner with Lou DiBella."
 
Shaw thought the deal was fair and presented the maximum purse that he could offer. 

"The fact is that I offered Perro $750,000 and told him that is all I have, he said he wanted a million. I hung up the phone and called his manager (Mike Criscio), told him what happened, and he said he would call me back. Criscio did call me back, and said Perro would take $900,000. I repeated what I had said, which was that $750,000 was all I had plus the shot at the middleweight title of the world. The rest is history, I called Lou who was being very fair and turned down the fight. I now think you will get to see Martinez vs [Paul] Williams 2 but that is just my opinion."
 
Mike Criscio told BoxingScene - "Look I talked to Perro's assistant multiple times. I told them that $750,000 was all I could get and he originally asked for 1 million. I never spoke to Perro directly.  I talked through his assistant.  I don't know if something got lost in translation or what but he then said he would fight for $900,000.  I told him that they wouldn't go that high and we should take the $750,000.  I told him we might be able to get them up to $800,00 but that would be about it.  I then called and texted them the rest of the day and the next day waiting on answer.  Finally after like 25 messages and texts I got someone to answer and they turned down the fight.  I know a lot of people think Martinez would win but I truly believe that Perro would have stopped him late."
 
After hearing from both sides of the story it seems like there must have been a misunderstanding on both sides.  It seems like most of their negotiations from previous bouts had a lot of give and take on both sides and in this case there was absolutely no room for negotiation. There was an urgency for the fight to be consummated quickly and Angulo felt that he would be able to negotiate for a little more based on negotiations from prior fights. 

Since it had worked before then you can't blame him for what had been good negotiating practices.  In this particular instance that just wasn't the case.  If Williams-Martinez 2 isn't made here shortly, lets hope that Angulo is offered the fight again.  I bet the negotiations will be handled differently on both sides and we will get a decidedly different outcome.
 
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