When everybody tagged the Pacquiao-Mayweather bout as the mega-sized boxing bout to change sports history, it was not based entirely on the actual clash of the supreme boxing fighters long dreamed to be inside the same ring, it was, as it turns out, because of the staggering $1 billion value that goes with it. While everyone thought the supersized fight would shatter records, no one has ever thought it would do it with a too-ambitious take.
Promoter Bob Arum is looking to make that possible by staging a pay-per-view of the mammoth brawl in mainland China. Arum foresees $300 million worth of pay-per-view in the country alone, as he expects more than 100 million people there are raring to go witness Pacquiao and Mayweather come to blows. He would pull off the grand stunt by having Filipino boxing champion Manny Pacquiao travel to Macau to promote the fight.
"I love fighting in Vegas but when I box in Macau it feels like a home game. This is only a 90-minute flight from Manila and we're expecting at least 5000 of my fans who can't always afford the cost of travelling all the way to America," Pacquiao said via Daily Mail.
The chosen setting for the major endorsement of the bout is Arum's crock of gold. The country is home to Chinese boxing superstar Zou Shiming, who has become an instant personality in China for his Olympic gold win in Beijing and in London in 2008 and 2012 respectively.
"Shiming is the driving force for taking pay-per-view into China. They idolize him and hundreds of millions have been watching him on regular television. Combine his appeal with Pacquiao-Mayweather and we are looking at numbers undreamed of before," Arum stated via Daily Mail.
Arum fine-tunes the pay-per-view price to $5. That means that China can single-handedly smash records by delivering $650 million. Let that sink in.
But of course, $5 is just too low for a spectator in the U.S. Arum is planning to attach another $90. Multiplying $95 to the projected 300 million U.S. watchers and payers, it would tote up to $300 million, meeting Arum's target. This would make the billion-dollar fight a literal billion-dollar fight. When it comes to the battleground, either Macau or Las Vegas is pitted to host the would-be legendary event.
While every bit of the larger-than-life fight is too much to contain for now, all that will not be as epic as it should be if Pacquiao loses to Algieri this Saturday. Nevertheless, Pacquiao has been open to the possibility of being part of a fight of a lifetime.
"I'll never be frustrated if the Floyd fight doesn't happen. Though I'm ready to fight him anytime, anywhere — it's him who refuses. I've made it clear that I want to fight him — it's up to him now," Pacman told The Telegraph. "It's obvious he is avoiding a fight with me. He always makes excuses. Just make the fight and stop talking. I've made it clear that my phone line is always open for him to call me."
