As BoxingScene.com previously reported, Top Rank CEO Bob Arum is planning to travel to the Philippines in August to have a meeting with eight division world champion Manny Pacquiao.
Arum has promoted Pacquiao for over a decade, but the Filipino superstar has openly claimed to be a promotional free agent.
“I just want to say hello to him again, I haven’t seen him for a long time. We are going to finalize that [trip] at the end of the week,” Arum told The Manila Times.
Pacquiao self-promoted his own comeback two weeks ago in Malaysia.
In his first bout in a year, he picked up a seventh round knockout of Lucas Matthysse. It was the first knockout victory for Pacquiao since November 2009.
Arum was absent from ringside, but the 86-year-old promoter explained that he can't be everywhere at once.
“I have nothing to say about it but he looked very good in the fight. Period," Arum said. “Do you understand I’m in a business, where I’m holding 30 events this year?. It’s many, many fighters from all over the world and I don’t concentrate all my efforts on Manny Pacquiao.”
There have been reports that Pacquiao may potentially have congenital heart disease. The veteran promoter is not worried just yet - until he gets all the facts.
“I really don’t know the facts about it. I just know that many years ago when I was doing a fight between Sugar Ray Leonard and Roberto Duran, the doctor in Montreal, where the fight was held, detected an abnormality in Duran’s heart which proved to be something genetic,” Arum added.
“And therefore it is something he was born with and not something that poses any danger. Maybe that is the situation of Manny, I just don’t know.”
Arum would like to match Pacquiao against two Top Rank fighters - WBA lightweight champion Vasyl Lomachenko and WBO welterweight champion Terence Crawford.