Manny Pacquiao remains one of boxing's few superstars, but even fighters of his caliber are struggling these days. Pacquiao looked as dominant as ever vs. Chris Algieri on November 22 in China, but only about 300,000 people are rumored to have paid to see his performance.
The 300,000 figure is just a rumor as of now, but the hype surrounding the fight never reached the peak of previous Pacquiao fights against bigger names like Juan Manuel Marquez, or even Timothy Bradley. The fight was expected to perform less than Bradley anyway, because of the bout being in China, but this bout was pushed hard in the United States.
The total will be a feather in the cap of Floyd Mayweather Jr. if it turns out to be accurate. He has long list of reasons for having not faced Pacquiao earlier in his career, but one of the major sticking points was Pacquiao's insistence on a 50-50 purse split. Mayweather sees himself as the sport's top draw, and a meager buy rate like this reported number helps his case.
Mayweather's views have dropped as well, however. He has failed to break one million buys in 2014-the last time he hit that number was his 2013 rout of Canelo Alvarez.
The declining figures could be a blessing and a curse. With a dearth of interesting opponents on the horizon for either fighter at welterweight, they likely need each other to drum up enough interest to surpass the one million mark again.
On the other hand, the recent numbers for Pacquiao are so low that Mayweather is likely to be stricter in his demands for a greater share of the purse if he even decides to think about facing Pacquiao.
That is unlikely to sit well with Pacquiao's promoter Bob Arum, whom Mayweather has sworn that he would never work with anyway.
One other factor is Canelo Alvarez's insistence on fighting on May 2, a date traditionally owned by Mayweather. Alvarez is in discussions with Miguel Cotto for a WBC middleweight championship bout on that date. While Alvarez alone may not be a bigger draw than Mayweather, that matchup is more compelling than Mayweather vs. Amir Khan or Devon Alexander.
If Alvarez forces himself on Mayweather's date, his only choice to compete for fans' attention may be to turn to Pacquiao.
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