Billy’s Boxing Blog

By William Trillo

At first I didn’t know why, but every time I started kicking around the latest Chapter in the Mayweather vs. Pacquiao negotiations that age old proverb about the 3 wise monkeys kept coming to my mind. Not wanting to let my instinct go to waste I did a little research.

According to Wikipedia.com there are various meanings ascribed to the monkeys but in the western world the proverbial principle is often used to refer to those who deal with impropriety by looking the other way, refusing to acknowledge it, or feigning ignorance.

Wait a minute!!

Turning your head the other way?

Pretending it doesn’t exist?

Playing Stupid?

Bingo!

You can go ahead and look over everything that has transpired recently and decide for yourselves who is guilty of what. Who is lying, who denies everything and who is playing stupid?

On his midnight conference call to announce Top Ranks decision to move on with Pacquiao’s plans, Bob Arum took the high road and did not name call or make accusations about anyone on Team Mayweather, in fact Arum was complimentary and even made logical excuses for Mayweather’s silence.

Following Arum’s lead I want to use the proverb to help those in need of some counseling during these ongoing and rough Mayweather vs. Pacquiao negotiations.

Speak No Evil:

“Without further do” I’d like to suggest that Oscar De La Hoya should put a self imposed gag order on himself for as long these negotiations go on. By remaining silent Oscar would never have told Univision in June, “Up until now, it’s been a very difficult negotiation process for various reasons, but right now we’re very close. We’re very close in finalizing the contracts that were once very complicated.”

On the surface that seemed like a very safe quote at the time but little did Oscar know that in the following month Leonard Ellerbe would deny any negotiations ever took place.

When confronted by Boxingscenes Robert Morales about his June statement De La Hoya backpedaled by saying, “I think I said it because I get the question asked so many times that, obviously, I was fed up and tired of it and I just said like, yeah, yeah, it’s gonna get made,” So it was a quick answer that I should have obviously thought about. But, obviously, negotiations weren’t going on. Nothing was going on.”

A self imposed gag order would have saved Oscar a lot of grief here and I recommend the most he says from this point on is “NO COMMENT!”

See No Evil:

He may have already put this into full effect, but if I am Richard Schaefer I stay away from every boxing news report in any newspaper or boxing website. By doing so he will save himself from having to see what Bob Arum has said about him in the past weeks. From being called a liar and making his boss Oscar De La Hoya look like an idiot, the verbal barbs flying in Schaefer’s direction are sharp and aimed to hurt, it’s best not to see them at all.

Look, Schaefer has proved himself to be great when it comes to financial maneuvering, no one will say otherwise. But if I were him, the next time I picked up a newspaper I would go straight to the business section and use the sports page to line his gilded cage.

Hear No Evil

For Leonard Ellerbe I believe this one is more cause and effect of not being told everything and has little to do with what he should do personally. Yes, I am suggesting that whoever is negotiating with Ross Greenburg may be telling Leonard little, if anything at all. Why would he?

When I asked Bob Arum about this in a conversation we had this week he told me the idea of Ellerbe being left out of the loop was so preposterous that he never wanted to discuss it again, but then he said, “Could it have happened that way? Sure anything can happen!”

To quote Dan Rafael from his article this week he wrote, “It’s impossible to fathom that Haymon forgot to mention that he was negotiating a $150 million fight to his most important client.”

And yes, it is difficult to believe Floyd was left out of the loop…but Leonard?

As our writer Luis Cadiz said this week the most likely scenario is Ellerbe is on a need to know basis, and right now maybe it’s been a case of, “Leonard don’t need to know nothing!”

I am sticking with that theory come hell or high water and I believe that until negotiations are complete, one way or another, Ellerbe will Hear No Evil.

Check out www.Pound4Pound.com for all the latest boxing news.

By William Trillo

The press release went out early this past Friday telling the media that Bob Arum would hold a midnight teleconference to let everyone know what would happen with the Manny Pacquiao vs. Floyd Mayweather negotiations and what was next if Floyd did not respond by that Friday’s deadline.

Just after midnight Arum got on the phone and stated, “…this Friday was the deadline of the end of the exclusivity period and I tell you that next week I’ll be talking to the Cotto and the Margarito camps regarding a fight with Manny Pacquiao”.

Basically what Arum was saying is that he needed to move on with negotiations for his “Bread & Butter” fighter Manny Pacquiao and he wanted to get a signed contract with Cotto or Margarito done quickly as preparation for the November 13th date needed to start right away.

But then Arum made a statement that left the door wide open for Mayweather, “ In the interim, while this was going on (negotiations with Cotto or Margarito), if Floyd suddenly emerged and said he wanted to do the fight, there would be nothing opposed to getting together and doing the fight.”

With that statement Arum put Mayweather and his Team exactly where they want to be, and that’s clearly in the driver seat in any negotiations with Pacquiao from this point on. It gives Floyd the mental edge he needs and always seems to get and as much as many of us hate to admit it, by leaving that door open Arum put an exclamation point on the Floyd Jr. quote, “All roads lead to Floyd Mayweather!”

Following up on some statements he made earlier in the month Arum again suggested that maybe Floyd didn’t want to fight this year because of the legal problems of his trainer/Uncle Roger.

For the life of me I can’t figure why Arum would start making excuses for Mayweather, and just like Arum said of Mayweathers silence,  “Who knows the reason for it? It is unfathomable…I just can’t figure it out.  But there are a lot of things I can’t figure out!”

I can’t figure out either.

I am sure that’s the same thing media members who were on the call said as they crawled back into bed.

I can’t help be see the following scenario playing out:

Arum will be about 24 hours from finalizing a fight with either of his alternate stars against Pacquiao when he receives a call saying Floyd has changed his mind and he wants the November 13th fight. Upon hearing the good news Arum informs his fighters their deal is off because Floyd is back at the table. Then all of sudden, hours turn into days, days turn into a week and still there is no other word from Team Mayweather. When they finally do surface they inform Arum that they are glad Manny agreed to the drug testing demands but now Floyd wants a much larger portion of the purse and unless Manny gives in there will be no fight. A fuming Arum blows up when he hears the new demand and the Super Fight again explodes in everyone’s face.

If you think that scenario is far fetched just go ahead and reflect back to December of 2009 when all sides reported that the Mayweather vs. Pacquiao fight was all but a done deal. Within days that fight fell apart because of Mayweathers drug testing demands and they have never been close again.

Reading reports of Mayweather casually playing basketball in Miami this weekend may tell you that Mayweather didn’t care one way or the other about Arum’s midnight call but trust me, Floyd and his advisor Leonard Ellerbe were closely monitoring the situation and they couldn’t be happier now that Arum has exposed his hand.

Check out www.Pound4Pound.com for all the latest boxing news.