It appears that the animosity between Floyd Mayweather Jr. and his former promoter Bob Arum will prevent a clash involving the two best fighters in the world from happening any time soon. Sources close to the situation have informed us that although Mayweather advisor Leonard Ellerbe likes the idea of a fight with Manny Pacquiao, Floyd Mayweather Jr. himself is adamant about his refusal to allow Arum to make anymore money off of his name.
Before his retirement, Mayweather vowed that he'd never do business with Arum again. Apparently, his hiatus from the sport has done little to change his mind. The last time the two worked together was in 2006 when Floyd fought and defeated Zab Judah to capture the IBF welterweight title. "You know, I appreciate Bob. You know, everybody – there's life, we're going to have our ups, we're going to have our downs. But, when it's time to go to a fight, we know it's business and we have to get along...The best fighter ever with the best promoter ever, and it's just an honor to be with Bob Arum," Mayweather would state during a conference call to promote that fight. In return, Arum showered Mayweather with his own compliments, stating, "His speed is phenomenal. The way he throws punches, phenomenal. The way he is conditioned, phenomenal. I mean, he's the entire whole package....Ray Leonard was a great fighter, Marvin Hagler was a great fighter, Duran certainly was great, Oscar had a couple of years where he was very good, but there's nobody that is a whole package like Floyd."
That was probably the last time the two men shared kind words about each other. Shortly thereafter, they parted ways as Floyd paid Arum $750,000 to buy out the remainder of his contract. It didn't take long for a war of words and lawsuits to follow. Mayweather made accusations that Arum mishandled his career and filed a lawsuit claiming he was shortchanged on money from previous pay-per-view bouts. Arum retaliated, smearing Mayweathers name, belittling his skills and countering with his own counterclaim that Top Rank was owed money from Mayweather. While it's unclear as to whether or not those lawsuits were ever resolved, the animosity between Mayweather and Arum still exists to this day. In fact, prior to Mayweather announcing his return, when asked about the possibility of a fight with Pacquiao, Arum replied, "He could go fuck himself. Tell him that...Fuck Mayweather! Pacquiao's the big attraction!"
Ouch! Damn Bob!
Well it looks like Mayweather shares some of those same sentiments as he recently made it clear to those close to him that he won't be rushing into a bout with Manny Pacquiao so long as Arum is involved, which, of course he will be. Geesh! Can't we all just get along? Let's hope that cooler heads prevail and both Arum and Mayweather can put their differences aside to give fans a real fight to save the sport. After all, if it makes dollars (and it will), it makes sense (and it does)!