Floyd Mayweather announced on Friday that he and Manny Pacquiao have agreed to fight May 2 at the MGM Grand in Las Vegas, which has been Floyd’s home for all of his fights since 2007.
The announcement finally brings together two of the premier fighters in the world after years of fans begging for them to meet in the ring.
It wasn’t until the two finally talked at a chance meeting at a Miami Heat game last month that the wheels were put in motion for the two to fight. They exchanged phone numbers, started talking, and negotiations went smoothly enough to the point that the fight was announced less than a month later. Execs even said that chance meeting “greased the wheels” for the process.
Sportsbooks have already released odds on the fight and have Floyd favored by a solid margin of 1:3 in many places. Mayweather is also the “A” side for the fight, which means he is getting a greater share of the pay. He reportedly will be getting the higher end of a 60/40 revenue split.
Showtime and HBO executives held a joint conference call Friday to answer some questions from the media.
Some of the large points we learned is that they are not ready to announce details about the pay-per-view and broadcasting schedule.
Here is what we learned:
– The pay-per-view will likely be a joint program put on by both HBO and Showtime.
– There will be an “all-star team” of talent from both networks working together on the show.
– There will be TV promotion but nothing about the 24/7 and All Access series has been announced yet.
Neither pay-per-view costs nor ticket prices have been announced yet, but we can expect all of that to be announced in the coming weeks. They are probably just spacing out the announcements.
