Pacquiao wants $20 million to face Crawford, says Koncz

MANILA, Philippines – Manny Pacquiao is open to facing unbeaten champion Terence Crawford but the 8-division champion wants a guaranteed $20-million purse, his adviser, Michael Koncz, told Philippine media.

Crawford (30-0, 21 knockouts), who is 9 years younger than Pacquiao at 29, is coming off a 2016 campaign where he won 3 fights. Most notable was his victory over Viktor Postol in July to unify the WBO and WBC junior welterweight titles.

“If it’s Crawford that Top Rank wants for Manny Pacquiao, then we’ll fight Crawford but we want a guarantee of $20 million, said Koncz, speaking with Manila Bulletin’s Nick Giongco.

Koncz revealed that Pacquiao would likely have to fight in April to fit into his schedule as a Philippine senator, as Congress is scheduled to adjourn from March 17 to May 1 this year.

Crawford of Omaha, Nebraska, is a former junior lighweight and lightweight champion currently rated number 5 on The Ring magazine’s pound-for-pound list.

Pacquiao (59-6-2, 38 KOs) is coming off a 12-round decision win over Jessie Vargas in November to win the WBO welterweight title for a third time. Pacquiao’s promoter, Bob Arum, told Rappler that Pacquiao would be paid “virtually on percentage” of proceeds from the event, while BoxingScene says Pacquiao’s purse on paper was $4 million.

“Whatever figure they put on the contract is meaningless because most of the money earned in this fight goes to Pacquiao,” Arum said before the Vargas fight.

Pacquiao has made over $20 million for several fights, including the Miguel Cotto and Shane Mosley fights, according to Forbes. The same news outlet reported he made $120 million for his May 2015 fight against Floyd Mayweather Jr, which he lost on points.

Pacquiao’s trainer, Freddie Roach, described Crawford to FightHub as “a young Mayweather” but said “he probably has a better punch than Mayweather.”

“We don’t want to be just fighting nobodies and so forth just to stay in the game. We still want to be the best.” – Rappler.com