Pacquiao used to be guaranteed no less than $20 million purse by his longtime promoter Bob Arum but when the pay-per-view (PPV) sales for his fights started to dwindle after his devastating loss to Juan Manuel Marquez in 2012, Arum had no choice but to cut the guarantee.
Except for his fight against Floyd Mayweather more than two years ago which grossed 4.6 million buys valued at over $500 million including gate and other revenues, all other fights Pacquiao did up to his bout against Jessie Vargas failed to hit a million mark starting with his bout against Brandon Rios which made a dismal PPV record of only 475,000 buys.
Fighters’ purses are based on their ability to attract fans to buy the fight and once they start losing or failing to put up a good fight for the fans, their PPV numbers drop especially if they fail to score KO wins.
This is the situation where Pacquiao is experiencing at the moment. While his victories are more than the number of his defeats since his loss to Marquez in 2012, his PPV numbers continue to slide with his last fight against Jessie Vargas hitting its lowest number since 2013 at 300,000 buys.
The continuing downward trend in Pacquiao’s PPV numbers is primarily brought about by his inability to score a KO win for the past eight years since his last knockout victory against Miguel Cotto in 2009.
For Arum to be goaded to bring back his usual guaranteed purse, Pacquiao needs to score a KO win to show the fans that he is still force to be reckoned with in boxing despite his advancing age.
Pacquiao’s longtime adviser Michael Koncz is no longer happy with the usual 12-round decision win saying he would sit down with Pacquiao to discuss the post-Horn fight scenario.
“Manny needs to make a statement. We can’t go and have a 12-round decision,” said Koncz on Sunday.
But Koncz is confident Pacquiao will score a KO win against Horn on Saturday.
“Jeff Horn is a great kid. Nothing personal against him, but he’s not in the league of Manny, hasn’t got the experience of Manny, probably has the heart of Manny,” he said.
“But with all of Manny’s experience and abilities, if we can’t win this fight decisively and have a knockout, then Manny and I need to sit down and consider what we will gonna do in the future. So it’s imperative we have to make a statement,” he added.
Koncz is likewise confident that a KO win against Horn will enable Pacquiao to regain the confidence and support of the fans in his future fights.
Pacquiao isn’t predicting a KO win against Horn but he knows that he needs to score one in order to preserve his marketability which is important in selling his future fights.
