Obviously, the real reason is Pacquiao’s shoulder injury and his doctor’s advice for him to rest from six to nine months to allow the healing from surgery to repair his shoulder rotator cuff.
Before his so-called “Fight of the Century” against Mayweather on May 2, Pacquiao was neck and neck with Mayweather in terms of popularity ratings.
Any journalist who wrote about Pacquiao or Mayweather during the week leading up to the day of the fight would get thousands of page views from fans around the world.
But lately only Mayweather is being talked about in the sport and very little about the Filipino ring star.
Mayweather has been very visible in broadcast media, projecting himself as the next top boxing promoter who cares about young and up-and-coming boxers wishing to become champions like him.
Even in social media, Mayweather is always a hot topic because he engages writers and broadcasters whenever he finds time. To him, any publicity (good or bad) is necessary to get the public talk about you.
This is the reason why Mayweather is popular. He makes his passionate fans happy with his rants while he makes some people envious or even angry about his character and lifestyle.
For Mayweather, it is important to get people talking about him even if some of them are angry. In fact many of his critics want to see him lose a fight because of their apparent dislike for him. But they continue to talk about him and even spend their hard-earned money to see his fights, hoping to see him lose.
While Mayweather has been engaging everyone who cares about the sport including the media, Pacquiao has shied away from the limelight since he lost to Mayweather. If he continues to be out of reach, soon he will fade away and will later find it hard to be on top of the popularity rating again.
Being popular is a must for sportsmen and celebrities including Pacquiao. Unless he is content with what he has accomplished after the Mayweather fight, he should be engaging media as well as the fans still there to support him.
Pacquiao beats Mayweather by a mile in terms of endorsements. Pacquiao makes decent money on product endorsements and if he becomes unpopular and rarely seen or heard, soon he won’t get anymore product endorsements.
Product or even service or institutional endorsements work best with popular people who are good role models and Pacquiao meets these qualifications.
Pacquiao need not talk about boxing to remain popular. He can talk about his charities, family and even his faith to keep media and his fans fully engaged while waiting for his ring return early next year.
Still, Pacquiao’s publicist may have a good reason why Pacquiao is not getting the usual publicity lately. Hopefully he has better plans to keep Pacquiao’s popularity soaring again very soon.
