Arum: I Never Discusssed Money for Pacquiao Fight with Crawford

By Keith Idec

Bob Arum supported Terence Crawford’s contention Saturday that Crawford never asked for $7 million – or any sum of money – to fight Manny Pacquiao.

Freddie Roach, Pacquiao’s trainer, told a group of reporters Wednesday in New York that Crawford requested a $7 million purse to face the Filipino superstar in his next fight. Arum, whose company promotes Pacquiao (59-6-2, 38 KOs) and Crawford (30-0, 21 KOs), clarified what he and Roach discussed two weeks ago regarding a potential Pacquiao-Crawford fight in April.

“I called Freddie up a few weeks ago because we wanted to talk to him about Crawford as a possible opponent,” Arum told BoxingScene.com on Saturday. “And that’s all we talked about. And he said, ‘Tough fight, but Manny would be OK with it.’ ”

An adamant Arum made it clear, though, that he never mentioned Crawford’s asking price to Roach because Arum never has spoken to Crawford about how much money the undefeated WBC/WBO super lightweight champion would want for what would be the biggest fight of his career.

“I never mentioned anything to Freddie about what Crawford wanted,” Arum said. “We never even presented the fight to Crawford. Crawford didn’t ask me for five cents. We never talked about it. [Top Rank president] Todd [duBoef] never talked to him about it.

“Nobody talked to Crawford about money, so the idea that Crawford somehow priced himself out of the fight is total bullsh*t. I mean, it’s just unfair to Crawford. We have never negotiated with Crawford on a Pacquiao fight. If that fight happens, like I said, it’ll happen later in the year. So it’s just not accurate and it’s unfair to Crawford. I mean, that’s just not right. It is just not right. Crawford, of all the fighters, is always very reasonable as far as the money he asks for for any fight that he has, no less Pacquiao.”

The 29-year-old Crawford sent out a Tweet earlier Saturday that refuted the rumor that he requested $7 million for a pay-per-view fight against Pacquiao. The Omaha, Nebraska, native reportedly made $1.5 million for his last fight, an eighth-round stoppage of John Molina Jr. (29-7, 23 KOs) on December 10 in Omaha.

Arum added that Crawford probably will return sometime in May in a fight that HBO would televise live on the network. He said his matchmakers would begin discussing potential opponents for Crawford sometime next week.

Keith Idec is a senior writer/columnist for BoxingScene.com. He can be reached on Twitter @Idecboxing.