No one actually believes that Floyd Mayweather and Manny Pacquiao will ever get in the ring together. However, maybe a major stumbling block to make that fight happen has been removed, as Mayweather parted ways with Golden Boy Promotions, which means that the Top Rank vs Golden Boy rivalry is no longer a reason to deny fans from getting a fight they’ve grown tired of waiting for.
Because Richard Schaefer, the man behind the success of the promotion for over a decade, couldn’t patch things up with the owner, Oscar De La Hoya, Mayweather is gone as well. Mayweather and De La Hoya don’t really like each other, but the presence of Schaefer made the cooperation possible. Now that the cooeparation is gone, Mayweather will rely on his own Mayweather promotions, run by Leonard Ellerbe.
When 50 Cent and Mayweather split back in the day, the rapper turned business man said that Mayweather Promotions is just a name, and that all the work is done by Ellerbe along with Golden Boy and especially Schaefer. Maybe this means that we’ll see Mayweather try to link up with Bob Arum and Top Rank? Hard to believe after all the bad blood and words said between the two, but Mayweather will do whatever the money dictates.
The interesting thing in all of this? The fights, not the money. Mayweather splitting from Golden Boy might actually mean he won’t fight boxers from that promotions company, and turn his attention to Top Rank or “independent” fighters. It’s hard to say at this stage, but everyone wants a piece of Mayweather because of the ratings and money he brings in to fights, although he won’t pass 1 million for his fight against Maidana, and many fans felt hurt by him choosing someone that they didn’t pick in the polls he set out for them.
Manny Pacquiao is a Top Rank man, and we won’t see the two set a date with each other for September. However, once you get beyond the blood test requests and the money issues, maybe the feud between Golden Boy and Top Rank, now that it’s no longer in the way, might turn out to be the biggest obstacle that bothered the two most popular fighters of the last seven-eight years to get together in the ring.
There’s no reason to be too optimistic from what we know about this business and about the people involved in setting the fights. History teaches us some things, and that it’s not going to be easy putting these two in the rings – money, ego, pride and fear getting in the way. But one less hurdle and interference can’t do no harm, right? Maybe Golden Boy getting out of the way, not to mention the promotion’s potential demise, will put us on the path to get this fight done a few years too late.