Fans have been waiting a long time to see Floyd Mayweather Jr. and Manny Pacquiao face off in the ring. Well, it is happening now, and both HBO and Showtime have together made sure everything will go ahead as smooth as possible.
Pacquiao and Mayweather Jr. signed on the dotted lines to finally hit the ground running and put on a good fight on May 2. The signing of the deal was done at MGM Grand in Las Vegas. To make things interesting, HBO and Showtime have also agreed to share the revenues made from the fight.
Such a collaboration is rare. A similar collaboration was done back in 2002 when Mike Tyson went up against Lennox Lewis. Tyson lost that fight, which was expected since Lewis was at his best and Tyson was then a soldier falling from grace.
"We each have our businesses to run, and we're going to continue to compete the way we do, but if something of this magnitude presents itself, and we can collaborate in this way, we will," said HBO Sports president Ken Hershman. "It doesn't always work out, but this time it did."
We're glad it worked out because the fight between Mayweather Jr. and Pacquiao is bound to be an enormous success. Mayweather's last fight was with Saul Alvarez, and that turned out to be a great fight, one that earned over $200 million.
This particular fight, however, could earn upwards of $250 million despite the short marketing window. This is mainly due to Mayweather and how popular the boxer has become in the past couple of years. Everything he touches turns to gold, and this will likely be no different.
Who will win the fight?
Hard to tell, but if we were to place a bet, we'd go for Mayweather. In our eyes, he's faster, stronger, and very determined to be known as one of boxing's greats. He may have a problem reading properly, but that doesn't matter when a fight is on the horizon.
