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In the next 24 hours, negotiations will commence to arrange the biggest fight in boxing: Manny Pacquiao vs. Floyd Mayweather.

The former mythical pound-for-pound king before he took an almost two-year hiatus in 2007 — Mayweather — against the current one, an action hero who already is the greatest Asian fighter in history and one of the all-time greats from any era in any weight class.

After Saturday's shocking destruction of Miguel Cotto via 12th-round knockout, Pacquiao (50-3-2, 38 KOs) has earned a share of the lineal welterweight championship and picked up a major belt in his seventh different weight class.

Monday, Mayweather called out Pacquiao, saying the fighter has not come out and actually said he wants to fight Mayweather.

"Manny Pacquiao is the fighter and every time someone asks him if he wants to fight me, he says it is up to his promoter, he's going to take a vacation, whatever the answer is," Mayweather said. "I have yet to hear him actually say, 'yes I want to fight Mayweather.' We are the fighters and if one fighter is talking about fighting another fighter, then they should just come out and say it. Manny Pacquiao doesn't say anything directly about fighting me because he might just know it's not a fight he can win."

Said Bob Arum, chairman of Top Rank, which promotes the Filipino and formerly promoted Mayweather: "All you have to know is that my fighter and his trainer Freddie Roach have gone on record saying they're happy to fight Mayweather. Hopefully we'll be able to put this together," he said. "The one thing I'm not going to do, and the only thing that's going to kill this, is to negotiate through the newspapers. If that happens and egos get in the way, the fight might not happen. From our side, we're willing."

While Mayweather has been reluctant to say he wants to fight Pacquiao, even after his decision win against Juan Manuel Marquez in September, he's been vocal about Arum and suggests the promoter is afraid of putting Pacquiao in the ring with him.

"You know that isn't true," Arum says. "Maybe I prefer not to deal with him. But if your fighter wants a fight, you deal. Mayweather is not one of my favorite people and I'm sure I'm not one of his. What difference does that make?

"If we were talking about some match on (HBO's) Boxing After Dark, then you can have plenty of spite and no one loses very much on a fight not being made. In this case it's more than just the money. It's the fact that boxing is on a roll. It's doing great. If this fight doesn't happen it hurts the momentum of the sport and that does a disservice to the sport. I'm keenly aware of that."

The undefeated Mayweather says he just wants to hear the words come from Pacquiao that he wants to fight.

"Tell Manny Pacquiao to be his own man and stop letting everyone, including his loudmouth trainer (Freddie Roach), talk for him," said Mayweather. "I am my own boss, speak for myself and tell it like it is. If Manny Pacquiao wants to fight me, all he has to do is step up to the plate and say it himself."

Article Link:
http://www.usatoday.com/sports/boxing/2009-11-16-boxing-mayweather_N.htm?poe=HFMostPopular&loc=interstitialskip