All for the money

The main hype surrounding the upcoming third fight between Manny Pacquiao and Juan Manuel Marquez is that it will supposedly settle the unsettled question of who really won in their first two fights.

That, of course, is a lot of baloney. The only real unsettled question between the two is until when will people pay good money to see them fight. For as long as a fight makes the cash register ring, a boxer will fight whoever is thrown against him in the ring.

No less than Pacquiao himself said so countless of times, that he will fight whoever his promoters throw at him. In other words, it is not Pacquiao who determines his career path in his chosen sport.

More importantly, Pacquiao is prepared to accept the consequences of the decisions other people make for him. That being so, it is therefore never a matter of settling some unsettled question. Had his promoters decided otherwise, there wouldn’t have been a third Marquez fight.

The biggest proof that boxing as a professional sport is all about money was provided by no less than the “greatest” boxer of all time, Muhammad Ali. On June 26, 1976, Ali fought the wrestler Antonio Inoki over 15 rounds in Tokyo.

Of course, as in Pacquiao-Marquez III, the hype was all about settling the unsettled question of who was the better fighter — a professional boxer or a professional wrestler. As to whether Ali and Inoki truly wanted to settle the question, the fight provided the answers.

Almost throughout the match, Inoki can be seen on his back doing nothing but kick at the legs of Ali. And in all of the 15 rounds, Ali managed to throw less than a dozen punches. Clearly there was no other way to call the bout but a draw.

But it was not exactly a draw because Ali made $6 million (an astronomical amount in 1976) out of the farce, while Inoki earned $2 million (more than he ever earned as a wrestler) for his role in the rip-off. As to the fans, they were the real losers.

Professional boxing is not about settling unsettled questions. It is always about money. Ask any boxer who enters the ring for the first time. No one goes into professional boxing simply for fun or for sport, the way Michael Jordan took to golf, or Dr. Yong Larrazabal to running.

A professional boxer takes up the sport to earn money he thinks he could not earn some other way. Take Pacquiao. Lacking education and the opportunities that come with it, he realized he has a better future reorienting his hands from making bread to throwing punches.

Most of the time, professional boxing is a desperation sport, making use of that most basic tool a person comes equipped with to acquire what he cannot otherwise acquire by more sophisticated, and more expensive, means, like education.

I have yet to see an already successful self-made person take up professional boxing, whether as a sport or to earn even more money. Professional boxing is simply too dangerous that the only people who take it up are those for whom life has left with not too many options.

It may be argued Pacquiao now has so much money he could not still be in the game simply for money’s own sake. But to say so is to forget that Pacquiao used to have nothing. If the Wall Street moguls cannot have enough, how much more for the poor boy from Dadiangas.

But if you are still not convinced that Marquez III is all about money and not to settle some unsettled questions, then why is there a clause in the fight’s contract for a fourth bout in case the bout again gets too clause too call?

And why are there already feelers for Pacquiao to fight Floyd Mayweather Jr. even before the Marquez III fight has been fought? Because that is where the real money is, regardless of how unsettled the Marquez III fight will turn out to be.

Of course boxing fans would love a Pacquiao-Mayweather fight. But that is not something the fans will split hairs over if it does not happen. Life will go on even if that fight remains unsettled. It is the lost opportunity to make more money that will drive some people nuts.