Manny Pacquiao vs. Oscar De La Hoya Boxing Fight

Oscar De La Hoya to Pay Manny Pacquiao $3 Million for Every Pound Over 147

Team Pacquaio has struck a good deal regarding this stipulation in the fight contract. They have smartly lessen some advantages that Oscar De La Hoya may have over Manny Pacquiao come fight night.

If ever Oscar De La Hoya fails to come during the weigh-in with the right weight, Manny Pacquiao already is sure to bag several million dollars from him with his negligence.

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DL Hoya to pay $ 3 million for every pound over 147

Source: Manila Bulletin Online
By Nick Giongco

Oscar De La Hoya is dead-certain of tipping the scales at 147 lbs or even less during the official weigh-in on the eve of his Dec. 6 brawl with Manny Pacquiao.

"I have already talked with Bob Arum and he told me that Oscar has agreed that the penalty will be $ 3 million for every pound or a fraction thereof in excess of 147 lbs (during the weighin),"said Pacquiao lawyer Franklin Gacal yesterday.

Gacal had batted for the inclusion of that agreement in the official fight contract to prevent De La Hoya from gaining more advantage as he is naturally the bigger boxer.

"Oscar is the bigger boxer, is taller (at 5-10 as to Pacquiao who is 5-6) and has the reach advantage," said Gacal, noting that the Golden Boy will have to sweat it out to make the welterweight limit.

In his last two fights — against Floyd Mayweather and Steve Forbes—De La Hoya came in at 150 lbs.

De La Hoya, who turns 36 in February next year, hasn’t fought at welterweight since stopping Arturo Gatti in March 2001 but is confident that he can still make the weight.

After destroying Gatti, De La Hoya campaigned mostly at super-welterweight (154 lbs) aside from moonlighting as a middleweight (160 lbs) in 2004.

Pacquiao, who turns 30 on Dec. 17, started out as a light-flyweight (108 lbs) when he turned pro in 1995 and has since moved up to lightweight (135 lbs), winning world titles at flyweight (112), super-bantam (122) and super-feather (130) along the way.

Despite his obvious size advantage, De La Hoya is of the opinion that by fight night, boxing fans won’t notice the difference.

"Well, I think first of all a lot of people are going to be very surprised when we’re standing next to each other. Size really isn’t going to be that much of a big difference. It’s not going to be like Roy Jones against John Ruiz with the size differential," said De La Hoya during a teleconference call from Los Angeles.

Despite the tremendous odds, Top Rank chief Bob Arum believes Pacquiao has more than genuine chances of upsetting De La Hoya.

"Manny has got lots of speed and his southpaw style will frustrate Oscar," said Arum, who promoted De La Hoya from 1992 up until 1999 when he severed ties with the 76-year-old Harvard-educated lawyer from New York.

Arum added that Pacquiao-De La Hoya will rank among the all-time greats, stressing that the match up will be mentioned in the same breath with the Ali-Frazier trilogy in the 1970s and Sugar Ray Leonard’s historic bouts with Thomas Hearns and Marvin Hagler of the 1980s.

"This fight has worldwide implications. It is an American Olympian fighting against the greatest fighter, the greatest athlete to come from the country of the Philippines. And, someone of my age, I realize what the Philippines has meant to the United States, what it’s meant to the world. The Philippine people fought courageously with the Americans at Bataan and Corregidor in the second World War."