Larry Brown Sports

50 Cent is just rubbing things in at this point. The rapper/businessman shared the above picture of him with his arm around the shoulder of boxer Manny Pacquiao on Monday, along with the caption “Big business moves.”

It was reported last week that 50 and Pac-Man were planning to team up to form a promotional company. The original plan was for Floyd Mayweather to be a part of the team, but 50 said his boxing buddy has been acting differently since getting out of prison. Rather than wait for Mayweather to get with the program, 50 proceeded and is forming a company just with Pacquiao instead.

Not only will it be interesting to see what happens with Floyd and 50′s relationship going forward, but it will also be interesting to see how the new promotional company affects the boxing game.

H/T Black Sports Online

As the relationship between Floyd Mayweather Jr. and 50 Cent sours, the rapper has turned to his ex-best friend’s biggest rival for a business venture.

According to Boxing Scene, 50 Cent and Manny Pacquiao are planning to form a promotional company.

Pacquiao’s advisor, Michael Koncz, spoke with Boxing Scene about the development of the idea.

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Manny Pacquiao is scheduled to fight again on November 10 and his promoter reportedly is considering three opponents.

According to the LA Times, promoter Bob Arum is considering a rematch with Timothy Bradley, a fourth fight with Juan Manuel Marquez, or a second fight with Miguel Cotto. The opponent reportedly will be selected in July.

We already knew that a fight against either of the first two gentlemen was being considered, but the possibility of Pacquiao facing Cotto again is a relatively new idea.

But you know what’s not different? That all three opponents are promoted by Arum’s Top Rank Promotions.

There’s no real draw to any of the aforementioned fights. We’ve already seen Pac Man-JMM three times and they’ve all been close, so I doubt we’ll see anything new there. Nobody wants to see Timothy Bradley again after he was gifted a decision last time. Cotto’s fine as an opponent, but still, all we want is Floyd Mayweather. Of course that’s not going to happen, so fans will just have to pony up $70 in November to find out what Bob Arum’s latest script says.

Photo: Chris Cozzone/FightWireImages.com via US PRESSWIRE

Fresh off his controversial loss to Timothy Bradley, Manny Pacquiao has gotten himself his own helicopter.

A way to cheer himself up? Not exactly.

Pacquiao says the chopper is for traveling between his home province in the Philippines and the capital Manila, where of course he is a congressman. So, the purchase isn’t strictly for luxury. That’s what his yacht is for.

The “slightly used” Bell 206A Jet Ranger seats five people. Pacquiao has already given it a custom paint job and slapped his logo all over it. All in all, it was a $427,000 (roughly 18 million Philippine pesos) bill for the boxer.

But when you’re now the second highest-paid athlete in the world, why not?

Video via ABS-CBN News

Boxing’s leadership and phony organizations remain as pointless as ever.

The WBO, which gave Timothy Bradley a shot at Manny Pacquiao’s welterweight champion belt on June 9 in Las Vegas, conducted a review of the controversial decision.

All five WBO judges who reviewed the fight scored it in favor of Pacquiao. In fact, Pac Man won 9 rounds to 3 on average based on these judges’ cards.

Their scores were: 118-110, 117-111, 117-111, 116-112 and 115-113.

The good news is it remains pretty unanimous that Pacquiao won the fight. The bad news is the WBO validated the robbery, yet won’t do anything about it.

What’s the point of conducting a review if you won’t do the right thing and overturn the decision? Why not invalidate Bradley’s belt and give it back to Pacquiao? Oh, because boxing organizations are meaningless and work in cahoots with promoters? Because promoters like Bob Arum have been reviewed in the past for bribing these organizations? Oh, okay, now I get it.

To make matters worse, Pacquiao is now saying he wants a rematch with Bradley to win his belt back legitimately. Again, this is all following Bob Arum’s script and avoiding what the public wants: a fight with Floyd Mayweather Jr. finally.

The bottom line is boxing needs a massive overhaul that should begin with federal regulation and a commissioner. This is something I aspired to do when I was in college, and a movement in the senate has actually begun toward that goal.

“Money” isn’t just a nickname for Floyd Mayweather — it’s a billing he has lived up to.

The undefeated boxer and current jail inmate topped Forbes’ list of the highest-paid athletes, unseating Tiger Woods who topped the list since 2001. What’s more is that another boxer was second on the list.

Manny Pacquiao — Floyd’s biggest rival even though they haven’t fought — came in second on the list. Floyd earned $85 million from his two fights, while Pac Man pulled in $62 million including $6 million from endorsements.

Tiger Woods’ total earnings were $59.4 million, 55 of which came from endorsements. LeBron James was fourth, Roger Federer pulled in over $52 million to come in fifth, and Kobe Bryant was the second basketball player on the list coming in sixth. Phil Mickelson was seventh thanks largely to his $43 million in endorsements.

Soccer players David Beckham and Cristiano Ronaldo were 8th and 9th respectably, while Peyton Manning came in 10th despite not playing last year because of a neck injury.

13 basketball players made the top 100, while 30 football players made it, topping any sport. However, the football numbers are somewhat misleading because several players were paid bonuses last summer that didn’t hurt the salary cap, but increased their earnings.

Athletes from 11 different sports made the list, including two cricket players and track star Usain Bolt, who earns $20.3 million. Two women made the list, and both were tennis players.

Maria Sharapova’s $27.9 million placed her 26th on the list. Li Na made $18.4 million thanks largely to endorsement deals with multiple Chinese companies.

So yeah, now that you’ve seen the numbers you know whey Floyd Mayweather Jr. tells everyone his paycheck is like your social security number.

Here’s the entire Forbes list.

Despite initially saying that a rematch with Timothy Bradley was the best next option for his fighter, Manny Pacquiao‘s promoter Bob Arum is now leaning closer to scheduling a fourth fight this fall against Pacquiao’s Mexican rival Juan Manuel Marquez.

“If the conditions are met, if someone puts up the money, we could take the fight to Mexico,” Arum said, according to ABS-CBN.

Arum said he and Pacquiao still need to consider what their more lucrative option would be. He also added that the Mexican government contributing money would make a Paciquiao-Marquez bout more likely to happen.

“The government knows what that kind of an event would do in the city and they know the economic benefits there would be,” Arum said. “[The leaders in Mexico City] should work together to [make it happen].”

Pacquiao won his previous two fights against Marquez, the latest being a controversial majority decision in November. Both boxers fought to a draw in their first bout in 2004.

Marquez’s promoter Fernando Beltran has already confirmed to ESPN that a fourth installment of the rivalry is going to happen this November.  Naturally, Beltran believes this is the best option from Pacquiao’s perspective.

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