Manny Pacquiao, Not Bob Arum, Should Choose Next Opponent

By Troy Sparks

For Top Rank promoter Bob Arum to choose Manny Pacquiao's next opponent is absurd.  I think he should let Pacquiao choose who he wants to fight next.

Arum said recently that the camp is giving Floyd Mayweather Jr. a timetable to respond to the challenge of fighting Pacquiao.  They're waisting their time waiting on Floyd to make up his mind.

I found on Mayweather's tweets that he was courtside watching a Miami Heat game with a rapper.  This is the time that Don King should put the heat on "Money" to roll with the punches or fold.

Seeing Floyd on Facebook posing with stacks of money burned my stomach inside out.  No one wants to see him pose with lots of money.  Boxing fans want him to pose in front of cameras to accept the fight with Pacquiao.

If I'm Arum, I'd give Mayweather two weeks because he had about seven months off.  If the big chicken ducks Pacquiao—as rumors circulated that he won't fight the pound-for-pound king—then the show must go on.

We know that Shane Mosley is a safe bet because he's older and desperate and so is Juan Manuel Marquez.  Pacquiao could go in any direction, but he should stay away from Andre Berto.

Mosley was supposed to have a firsthand look at Berto, but the Haitian-born boxer canceled their match to help disaster victims in his native country.  I think that Pacquiao fighting Berto would be a career risk to take.

Berto, like Mayweather, is undefeated.  He won the WBC Welterweight title and defended it a handful of times.  If Pacquiao wants to take that risk, he'll win and collect his ninth belt.  So either way, the Pac Man could give either unbeaten fighter his first professional loss.

Until then, we await Mayweather, who had forever to do something about the criticism he faces every time he steps out the door, to deliver and stop saying that he's God's gift to boxing.