Movement has stalled on both the Manny Pacquiao vs. Floyd Mayweather Jr. and Canelo Alvarez vs. Miguel Cotto talks, but Freddie Roach, who trains both Pacquiao and Cotto, is optimistic the former will happen.
"Pacquiao-Mayweather is the only one that can override Canelo-Cotto," Roach told Sweet Science. Roach also envisioned a scenario in which Cotto agrees to terms to fight Alvarez, which would motivate Mayweather to accept a Pacquiao fight and maintain his beloved May 2 date.
"Then I think Mayweather does accept the Pacquiao fight," Roach said. "I'm being optimistic by saying Mayweather will fight Manny because I just want that fight to happen so bad."
Pacquiao has seemed to be the more eager of the two to get the wheels in motion, prodding Mayweather repeatedly via social media to stop stalling. Here is Pacquiao on New Year's Eve inventing hashtags to convince the pound-for-pound king to step in the ring.
Then on Instagram Pacquiao posted a photo of himself in humble surroundings to contradict an earlier Mayweather post that featured him posing in front of his private jet and extensive collection of pricy sports cars.
The Mayweather and Pacquiao fight may be less about fear, and more about money now though. While Cotto is rumored to be holding up the deal because of haggling over his purse, Mayweather is also making things difficult by demanding two-thirds of the revenue.
There is plenty of time between now and May 2, when both Alvarez and Mayweather want to fight, but with dueling cards being an extremely unlikely outcome this is looking like a game of chicken.
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