MANILA, Philippines - Freddie Roach is marking the date: May 2.
And he’s got a name on it: Floyd Mayweather Jr.
“I am. It needs to happen for both guys,” said Manny Pacquiao’s trainer during an interesting chat with Michelle Beadle for HBO’s The Fight Game.
Bob Arum said May 2 may not be the perfect date for Mayweather vs Pacquiao because it falls on the week commemorating the victory of the Mexican army over the French forces on May 5, 1862.
Arum said the date is more suited for Mexico’s Canelo Alvarez versus Puerto Rico’s Miguel Cotto.
But Roach, who trains Cotto, feels there’s no better fight out there than Mayweather-Pacquiao – whether it’s Cinco de Mayo or Independence Day.
“I can’t wait to get ready for Floyd,” added Roach.
“He is a challenge. I have a great fighter but we have to fight the perfect fight to win this fight,” he said, adding that Pacquiao must have to do things differently against Mayweather.
“I know that. Be a little meaner and be a little more feisty,” he told Beadle during the interview done inside his Wild Card Gym in Hollywood.
Roach said Mayweather is not the guy Pacquiao should touch gloves with a dozen times during the fight.
Over the past few weeks, people have talked about the fight, and while Arum is in talks with CBS big boss Les Moonves, there are other forces trying to make it happen.
An investment group from Abu Dhabi has dangled a $120 million offer to Mayweather for him to fight Pacquiao in the Middle East in the first six months of 2015.
But Mayweather has yet to bite.
Roach said it’s not the money that’s holding Mayweather back.
“I think he’s a little bit afraid to take the challenge because he’s so in love with that zero in his record,” he told The Fight Game of Jim Lampley.
If Mayweather doesn’t fight Pacquiao, the flamboyant American will face only one question the rest of his life: Why didn’t he take it?
Moonves and Arum are looking for ways to make the fight for Showtime and HBO.
Roach is hoping that Moonves could make it happen.
“He said he could deliver Mayweather and he hasn’t done that yet. We’ll see,” Roach said.
“I think we’ve waited long enough,” he said.