Double header to remember

fight fans have long been salivating at the thought of seeing Manny Pacquiao and Nonito Donaire, Jr., easily the country’s best prizefighters today, in the same card. There were impromptu proposals in the past but they never got off the blueprint stage. There were even kibitzers who opined that Pacquiao’s camp didn’t want it to happen out of fear that Donaire might steal the spotlight from the ‘Pac Man.’

It took an announcement from Bob Arum, who promotes both boxers, to finally get the ball rolling. Arum recently disclosed that Pacquiao and Donaire will appear in the same card scheduled on November 5 at the Thomas & Mack Center, Las Vegas, Nevada.

Pacquiao will be the main event fighter as he takes on American Jessie Vargas (27-1, 10 knockouts) for the World Boxing Organization (WBO) welterweight (147 lbs.) championship. Donaire, the incumbent WBO junior featherweight (122 lbs.) titlist, will appear in the supporting main event, most likely against No.1 contender Jessie Magdaleno (23-0, 17 knockouts). The choice of Vargas and Magdaleno makes a lot of marketing sense as they both hail from Las Vegas, Nevada. Vargas is the defending WBO welterweight champion while Magdaleno will figure in his first world title shot. This early, Pacquiao and Donaire are the smart money bets to prevail.

Donaire (37-3, 24 knockouts) is being included in the card because of the lukewarm reception the Pacquiao-Vargas fight has been receiving. It will be recalled that HBO, the long-time pay-per-view distributor of Pacquiao’s fights, decided to stay away from the fight to focus its promotional machine on the November 19 light heavyweight unification showdown between Sergey Kovalev and Andre Ward.