So the big news over the weekend involved pound-for-pound king Manny Pacquiao moving on from all the drama of his aborted mega-fight with Floyd Mayweather. After Pacquiao rejected a proposed bout against junior middleweight champion Yuri Foreman, his promoter Bob Arum of Top Rank announced that the boxer will instead face tough welterweight contender Joshua Clottey.

Clottey last outing was a razor-thin split decision against Miguel Cotto, a bout Clottey dominated in the latter rounds. The Ghanaian is renowned for his toughness, having never been knocked down in his career never been seriously hurt in his career (he was actually knocked down in the Cotto fight), and would certainly present a unique challenge for Pacquiao. Scott Christ of Bad Left Hook is already salivating over the prospect of the bout: “Clottey is a rock-solid welterweight who has never been stopped, and I don't even recall off the top of my head ever thinking he seemed particularly hurt. He's faced a lot of different styles and done pretty well against them all, from the tall and powerful Antonio Margario to the cunning and savvy Miguel Cotto to fast southpaw Zab Judah. None of those guys are Manny Pacquiao, but Manny Pacquiao's never faced a guy quite like Clottey, either, whose defense can be impenetrable at times. Not exactly the loose counter-punching of Juan Manuel Marquez or the bull-forward style of Ricky Hatton.” At least one blogger thinks that this will be Pacquiao’s biggest challenge yet.

Arum, meanwhile, scored another coup after coming to terms with Dallas Cowboys owner Jerry Jones to hold the fight in the $1.2-billion state-of-the-art Cowboy Stadium, a possibility nixed by Mayweather’s camp. Arum was schmoozing with Jones on the same night that VIPs such as George W. Bush were hanging out at the owner’s luxury suite during the Cowboys’ playoff victory over the Philadelphia Eagles this weekend. The new facility will also be playing host to the NBA All-Star Weekend in February.

(By the way, Arum says Dubya is a big Pacquiao fan. Pacquiao’s Nacionalista Party colleagues Satur Ocampo and Liza Maza must be thrilled. First Bongbong Marcos, now this. Who’s next, Hitler?)

Not to be left out, Mayweather’s promoter, Richard Schaefer of Golden Boy, also made noises about moving on as well. According to him, “Pretty Boy Floyd” is looking at a May date with Shane Mosley, to “shut up all those who are saying he's a coward.” This, of course, would still depend on a Mosley victory in his January 30 bout against Andre Berto, which is hardly a given.

These are fighting words from Mayweather’s promoter, and it remains to be seen if Mayweather will come through. The boxer has frustrated fans of the sport for ducking the best competition at the welterweight level over the last few years, skipping bouts against the likes of Mosley, Cotto, Clottey, and Margarito, to preserve his undefeated record. Will Floyd really put his record on the line against a dangerous opponent, or will he take on a scrub like Matthew Hatton or Paulie Malignaggi?

It should be noted that a late spring bout for Mayweather would still leave a fall bout between him and Pacquiao open, should the two parties opt to revisit the mega-fight. But with potentially dangerous opponents (definitely for Pacquiao), neither boxer could really afford to look that far ahead.

UPDATE: Dan Rafael of ESPN reports that it looks like Mayweather will keep the March 13 date too, to go head-to-head with Pacquiao. Bad Left Hook details why this is an awful idea, because of the lack of quality opposition for Mayweather if he does not fight the winner of Mosely-Berto.

Fire Quinito rounds up the best commentary about the fallout of Manny Pacquiao and Floyd Mayweather’s failure to come to terms for a mega-fight, so you can go back to reading why Jinkee Pacquiao said "I hate Krista."

Ron Borges, Boston Herald: “Boxing’s ability to destroy its image rivals that of Tiger Woods. The only difference is boxing has more practice at it. For the past decade or so, the men who run the sport have been on a constant campaign of self-immolation, finally doing to boxing what the Mafia could not when they controlled it. They made it irrelevant in the eyes of many sports fans and even more sports editors. Yet as Bernard Hopkins once said, ‘As long as you got ghettos, you’ll have boxing,’ and so boxing has survived relentless efforts to ruin itself.”

Michael Rosenthal, The Ring: “Right now, devoted fans worldwide are depressed over the news that the March 13 showdown – between the Nos. 1 and 2 fighters in the world – apparently is off in spite of ongoing negotiations and two days of mediation. The sides simply couldn't agree on a cut-off date for blood testing. So that appears to be that. The fans have and will continue to blame the side they feel is at fault. The Pacquiao supporters lambast Mayweather for making an unreasonable demand they feel places the Filipino’s character in question. The Mayweather supporters will always ask whether taking a random blood test is really such a big deal. Whichever side you’re on, everyone eager to witness what would’ve been an enormous event has one thing in common: Profound disappointment.”

Lance Pugmire, Los Angeles Times: “The mediator who worked to strike a deal between Floyd Mayweather Jr. and Manny Pacquiao today attempted to set the record straight as to why negotiations fell apart and why Pacquiao's promoter, Bob Arum, is saying the fight is off. Mediator Daniel Weinstein, a retired federal judge who listened to the Pacquiao and Mayweather representatives all day Tuesday and continued talks Wednesday, said in a statement released by Mayweather's promoters that the fight unraveled because ‘the parties could not agree on a testing protocol acceptable to all.’ A statement by Mayweather is expected shortly, but Weinstein also noted in his statement that he wanted to correct some ‘erroneous’ news reports of why the talks crashed.”

Scott Christ, Bad Left Hook: “I am neither blaming Floyd nor Manny exclusively. Both of them and their teams have put a dent back in boxing that everyone in the sport had been working for about three years to take out. It started when Floyd and Oscar de la Hoya met in 2007, a fight that broke all the records and demonstrated to the promoters that when you work together on big fights, good things happen for the sport. More and more, detractors, naysayers and the mainstream media in general looked at boxing as a revitalized sport, where things could get done, where the mismatches and garbage main events had been at the very least greatly diminished, if not firmly cast aside. Things were happening again with arguably the oldest sport in the world. Mayweather-Pacquiao would have trumped them all. Not since Sugar Ray Leonard and Thomas Hearns in 1982 had the two very best fighters in the world come together for a single showdown. And not only were they the best, they were the biggest stars, the sport's two clear money men.”

Tim Starks, The Queensberry Rules: “But there is one way in which boxing ruined itself with greed by letting Mayweather-Pacquiao fall to the wayside. By each party catering to their own selfish whims, they robbed boxing fans of the fight everyone wanted to see, a match between the two best fighters of the past decade, its two biggest stars, its two best fighters of today aligning for a rare potential showdown in the same welterweight division. These are men who so prefer to indulge their own basest desires that they would rather send a giant ‘f-you’ to their customers than set those base desires aside for a moment. They don't care what harm comes to the sport that earned them their livings, whether boxing pisses away every bit of momentum it had gained since 2007, when everyone began to realize it was a good idea to regularly have the best fighters fighting each other, to give their customers what they wanted. Immediate gratification of short-term is more important than anything. Anything.”

The Las Vegas Review-Journal reported earlier today that the planned mega-fight between Manny Pacquiao and Floyd Mayweather is off, despite last minute mediation. According to the report, Pacquiao agreed to the revised proposal, which Mayweather rejected.

Pacquiao’s promoter Bob Arum confirmed the news to Dan Rafael of ESPN and Steve Kim of Max Boxing. Instead, Pacquiao will reportedly be facing junior middleweight champion Yuri Foreman in March. Meanwhile, various Internet sources have reported that Mayweather is looking to fight either Matthew Hatton or Paulie Malignaggi.

The news is a fatal blow to the sport, a total meltdown of Gilbert Arenas-on-Twitter proportions. Tim Starks of the Queensberry Rules puts it bluntly: “I have to consider quite seriously whether I can bring myself to care about this sport again.”

UPDATE: Kevin Iole was able to reach Pacquiao adviser Michael Koncz. “Manny’s reaction is that he’s very disappointed because he wanted to give the fans this fight,” Koncz told Iole.

I had a kick out of reading Ronnie Nathanielsz’ commentary in the Manila Standard last Tuesday, “Of truths and lies,” which was about the myths surrounding the drug-testing brouhaha that’s holding up the megafight between Manny Pacquiao and Floyd Mayweather. In it, Nathanielsz basically rips into the camp of Golden Boy Promotions, Mayweather’s promoters.

It’s a curious tack from Nathanielsz to lecture about the truth, especially since he was once singled out by Manny Pacquiao himself for spreading lies and making up quotes that put the boxer in a bad light. But I suppose everything’s alright now that Nathanielsz has slinked and ensconced his way into the good graces of Top Rank Boxing’s Bob Arum. In fact, Arum alleges that Nathanielsz heard Golden Boy’s CEO Richard Schaefer suspecting Pacquiao of doping back in September. Golden Boy has since denied Arum’s allegation, and it’s unfortunate that Nathanielsz did not bother to clarify the matter in his column.

Things weren’t always this way between Arum and Nathanielsz. Back in 2006, in the midst of the tug-of-war between Top Rank and Golden Boy, Nathanielsz wrote a series of stories pushing the GBP agenda and dismissing Arum’s claims. He also got great access to Golden Boy’s top management, including this embarrassingly chummy interview with Oscar de la Hoya.

(Incidentally, Golden Boy also signed a broadcast deal with ABS-CBN Sports, which is identified with Nathanielsz. In 2008, Nathanielsz wrote a series of stories pleading with the PBA board to award the television contract to the giant network. Solar Sports won the deal, much to his chagrin.)

Over the past couple of years, Nathanielsz has slowly slithered his way into Arum’s camp, after the veteran promoter won the battle to promote Pacquiao. Again, incidentally, Top Rank and ABS-CBN announced a partnership deal last December.

Just some stuff to cap the sports week. Happy weekend everyone!

• Whenever I went out drinking with a boss from my old office and talk turns to UAAP basketball, he would always bring up how dominant Ateneo’s Danny Francisco was even against UP’s Benjie Paras, even though we were both Maroons fans. One of the biggest questions in Philippine basketball history, in my mind, was always how Francisco’s career would have turned out if he didn’t have the career-ending heart condition. Would he have been consistently dominant, like Alvin Patrimonio? Would he have been maddeningly up-and-down, like Benjie Paras? Would he have been the poster boy for wasted potential, like Jun Limpot? Or would he have been a bust like Alex Araneta? It’s a shame that we’ll never know.
  
  In his latest story for Inbound Pass, Charlie Cuna writes about another player who remains legendary for his college exploits: Eddie Viaplana, the De La Salle hotshot who shared the backcourt with “The Bullet” Dindo Pumaren. Viaplana blew out his knee before getting to the PBA. We’ll never know how good he could have been: was he going to be another Caidic? Or maybe he was an Apet Jao or a Joey Guanio. Or somewhere in between, like a Naning Valenciano.


• My buddy Toff Rada argues that basketball is an essential skill for the incoming Philippine president now that the White House is occupied by an avid baller, and details the basketball credentials of presidential candidates Noynoy Aquino, Erap Estrada, Dick Gordon, and Gibo Teodoro. If you could assign basketball teams to each, Aquino would definitely be Purefoods (James Yap, after all, is his brother-in law), Teodoro, the so-called political son of Dandinng Cojuangco, would share his uncle’s favorite San Miguel, Erap would probably be have to take Ginebra because Johnny Walker Blue Label isn’t available, and Dick Gordon is a true-blue Eagle. By the way, is anyone else surprised that all these years, Manny Villar didn’t try to bankroll the UP Fighting Maroons just for the exposure he’ll get? I mean, it didn’t take him long to become the top patron of billiards in the country, and he’s gotten to be close to Pacquiao too. I wonder why he didn’t bother ‘investing’ in basketball.


• Carlos Acevedo of the boxing blog The Cruelest Sport eavesdropped on the hilarious negotiations for the Manny Pacquiao-Floyd Mayweather superfight. Seriously though, Bob Arum is reportedly in town to discuss the final details of the fight with the Pac-Man.


• An American boxing promoter in Cebu was arrested this week for bringing an underage girl into a hotel room. Which reminds me of one of Manila Vanilla’s posts from when he first arrived in the country: “Whenever you pass a middle-aged white man in Manila, you're faced with that all-too-common conundrum: Was he a missionary or a sex tourist?”


• Speaking of boxing, did you guys catch the sensational knockout by Danny Green over Roy Jones?