Round by Round: Weekly Boxing Notes

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↵I Hate to Say I Told You So
↵But I told you so. The Manny Pacquiao-Ricky Hatton fight, which yesterday was completely off forever and all time, is back on again today, and this time it looks like it’s finally a done deal. And thank Jeebus for that, cause this crap was getting seriously boring. Pacquiao at last came to his senses and acquiesced to a 52-48 split in his favor of the various gates (he wanted 55-45). The fight is scheduled for May 2nd at the MGM Grand and will probably make about a bazillion dollars for everyone involved, such that these endless sniping negotiations will be utterly forgotten by both sides when all that cheddar comes rolling in. ↵↵It does seem likely, however, due to the fact that Manny didn’t everything he wanted (although I should point out that he did get almost everything he wanted), that he will open up an ever so slightly bigger can of asswhup on Hatton than he might have done otherwise. Not that this will change anything in the long run, but it should make the fight, and what I expect to be a lackluster romp for Pacquiao, a little more entertaining. ↵

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↵↵For my detailed thoughts and prediction on the fight itself, you can check my pieces over at No Mas. What I want to address here is the welcome news for all the diehard boxing heads out there that the Staples Center is reportedly sold out for tomorrow night. ↵

↵↵Now, this is a big fight, and it deserves to be sold out. Following his destruction of Miguel Cotto last summer for Cotto’s WBA welterweight belt, Margarito inherited the crown as The Reigning Mexican Blood and Guts Warrior, a coveted title that no doubt helped ticket sales in East L.A. Meanwhile, Mosley is a local guy and a long-time star of the sport. Both men are tough as nails and known to mix it up with ferocity every time they step in the ring. A fight between them promises fireworks along the order of the Margarito/Cotto bout and the Cotto/Mosley bout from December of ’07, fights which were both exceptional events.↵

↵↵Still, the fact remains that neither of these guys are Oscar De La Hoya or Mike Tyson level names. The fight has garnered little or no crossover press, and it’s been promoted hardly at all, so little in fact that there wasn’t even a Countdown show on HBO to hype it. ↵

↵↵And it nevertheless sold out an 18,000-seat arena in a troubled economy. Why? Because boxing is anything but dead, and when an event is staged in the right place and priced to move, the people will come out. ↵

↵↵We actually have the state of the economy to thank for the fight being in L.A. rather than Vegas and for the reasonable ticket prices, which were considerably scaled down from the usual high-roller casino prices to try and fill the Staples Center. If you’ve been to Vegas recently, you know that business is bad down there. Casinos can’t afford to gamble on anything right now but sure-thing fights like Pacquiao/De La Hoya to bring people into town. Margarito/Mosley was originally slotted to be a Vegas event, but the likely sites balked at the idea of staging a big event the week before the Super Bowl, figuring that with even high rollers tightening their belts these days, they wouldn’t draw the huge crowds out to the desert two weeks in a row.↵

↵↵So Top Rank and Golden Boy took the fight to L.A., lowered the ticket prices, and now they have a full house and, according to reports, the hottest ticket in Hollywood. Margarito’s promoter Bob Arum claims that Top Rank has gotten so many celebrity ticket requests that they are now completely tapped out. If he is to be believed, this will be the most blinged-out fight crowd since De La Hoya/Mayweather.↵

↵↵It’s all very good news for fight fans, and it seems like a trend that will continue so long as the recession puts such a hurt on the bottom line in Vegas. Look at the upcoming schedule and where the fights are being held -- Vic Darchinyan and Jorge Arce in Anaheim, HBO’s big Valentine’s Day triple-header featuring Alfredo Angulo vs. Ricardo Mayorga as the headliner in Sunrise, Florida, Top Rank’s in-house PPV doubleheader featuring Kelly Pavlik in Youngstown and Miguel Cotto at the Garden in New York, and then the much anticipated Juan Manuel Marquez/Juan Diaz fight in Houston. The next big (and by “big” I mean “marginally notable”) Vegas fight going off is the Chad Dawson/Antonio Tarver rematch at the Palms, and on that topic Bob Arum was recently hilarious, pointing out that the first Dawson/Tarver fight was at the Palms also, and they sold 300 tickets, so if they’re going back they must feel like they had 300 very satisfied customers. ↵

↵↵There’s no doubt that promoters and fighters make more money when they stage a big fight at the right time in Vegas. But the sport of boxing connects with more fans when the events are local and feature local fighters at ticket prices that are within reach of the common man. And, to paraphrase a bit of decidedly unpopular Reaganomics, that is a rising tide that lifts all boats. ↵

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