Money matter manhandling Pac-May fight
IF there’s one thing crazy—not unique—in the Pacquiao- Mayweather fight, it is the money matter into it.
Suddenly, seemingly, money is the only thing that matters in this bout.
Shockingly, the oodles of money to be earned by the combatants ($ 120 million for Mayweather thus far, $ 80M Pacquiao) and shelled out by spectators for tickets have become so bizarrely high that the fight is fast turning to be a for-billionaires-party only.
Quick, make a headcount of the billionaires in China. And Russia. And the US. Choice seats are exclusively for them. Have we all gone nuts? This is not a Sothesby’s auction. Or a night for oenophiles, who love to splurge on millions of dollars just to acquire a bottle of vintage wine like a Domaine Ponsot, Chateau Lafite Rothschild or La Tache.
And this is not even a world heavyweight championship fight. You want to know the ticket price in the Ali-Frazier fight billed as the Thrilla in Manila on Oct. 1, 1975 at the Cubao Big Dome in Quezon City? Twenty dollars. The late American novelist, Pulitzer Prize winner Norman Mailer, funnily queer that he was, had paid that amount— refusing an offer of free admission from Pres. Marcos no less.
In 2006 when I covered the Pacquiao-Morales third fight at the Thomas & Mack Center in Las Vegas (Pacquiao won by a 3rd round KO), I paid $87 for an upper box seat. I got a total of three tickets, the other two being for sisters Sol Juvida and Ofel Juvida- Magturo. Chicken feed. I had some money, courtesy of the newspaper that sent me to the Sin City.
Almost a decade later, that 87-dollar ticket is not even a mere drop in the bucket.
Because 9 or so days before the so-called Fight of The Century, the cheapest upper-deck seat is priced at $5,826, and a ringside seat $128,706. What the hell is happening? More than 2,000 people have died from the 7.8 magnitude earthquake in Nepal and here we are, seeing tickets to the fight selling at prices never seen before in Jupiter or Mars.
Now, with money raining cats and dogs into this bout, just imagine what’s going to happen should a rematch ensue.
Maybe Queen Elizabeth would be at ringside. Include King Bhumibol—if he’d be healthy by the time the return bout comes around.