Ask Manny Pacquiao why he believes boxing to be the greatest sport of all and there is no mention of the $120million he will be paid for going toe to toe with Floyd Mayweather in the most lucrative fist-fight in history.
Rather, his mind goes back to when the PacMan was the PacKid, a 12-year-old urchin in the mud of the Philippines whose mother was eking out the food for the family.
‘Somebody told me and my friends some fights were being put on in the town,’ he recalls. ‘I did not know what boxing was but they said you got a prize whatever the result. Two hundred pesos (two dollars) to win, a hundred to lose.’
‘So we went and I won. I took the two dollars home and gave them to my mother so she could put more food on the table. But when she asked where I got the money I didn’t tell her it was for fighting.‘We went back every Sunday and I kept winning the two dollars. Then my uncle came with a stack of videos and I watched Ali and Foreman and Holyfield and so many others.’ And so it began.
‘Boxing is the best sport because it teaches you about life,’ he says. ‘It taught me you will receive if you give back.’
It is a lesson he wants to pass on to Mayweather.
‘When this fight is finished I would like us to sit down quietly together to talk,’ says Pacquiao. ‘I want to speak to him about the Gospel of the Lord and how everything we get is a gift from God. How we are the stewards of this blessing and should use it for good.’
Since Mayweather is reputed to spend his fortunes on fast cars, fast living and fast women, this may seem an unlikely post-fight reunion. But the PacMan smooths the way to the Money Man by saying: ‘Floyd deserves his money because he’s earned it. He has the right to use it his way. But I would like to tell him how good it feels to help people who need it, like giving them plots of land and the houses they build on them.’
Pacquiao’s generosity to his impoverished countrymen is as legendary as Mayweather’s excesses, but it should be stressed that Floyd Jnr is charitable, too.But there is a difference, also, in their view of their craft.
Mayweather admits that he has fallen out of love with boxing and regards it now as a business. Pacquiao says: ‘Boxing is still my passion. I do it to please the fans, to give them excitement in return for their support. Not for the money. I am not a materialist.’
‘Whether it’s two dollars or a hundred million dollars — it’s what you do with it.’
Mayweather suspects that Pacquiao’s determination to give the fans their money’s worth on May 2 may be his downfall.
He describes Pacquiao as reckless, citing his KO by Juan Manuel Marquez as proof. The PacMan responds: ‘We would be nothing without the fans and this fight would not be so big. So we should entertain them. Yes, sometimes there is a price to pay, but it is worth it.’
Pacquiao wants to draw Mayweather into an open fight, saying: ‘If he comes to try to knock me out it would be good for me. We’ll see.’
Mayweather keeps insisting it is ‘just another fight’.Pacquiao says: ‘I’m excited. I love it. No, this fight will not define my career. That is done by all my accomplishments in becoming the only eight-division world champion. But winning this will be a big additional achievement for my legacy,’
His trainer Freddie Roach had been concerned that in rediscovering God he may have lost some of his bite — and hence the drop in knockout ratio.Pacquiao says; ‘My determination to win has never been higher than for this fight. My killer instinct is back.’
There is no rematch clause in the contract and Mayweather has expressed no appetite for there to be a second fight. But for Pacquiao one good reason would be for him to even up the split of the gigantic purse.
‘I am not happy to have conceded 60-40 per cent to Floyd,’ he says. ‘Negotiating would be easier for the rematch. To make this happen we had to give him everything he wanted. If there is a next time it would be a different deal.‘Not for me. For my people. I cannot see anyone going hungry and not help them.’
Once again, his mind is taking him back 24 years to the Philippines and those two-dollar fights. – Daily Mail