Showtime President of Sports Stephen Espinoza doesn’t have a lot of faith than we’ll be seeing a fight between Floyd Mayweather Jr. and Manny Pacquiao in he near future unless Pacquiao bites the bullet and chooses to leave Top Rank. Espinoza sees that as being the issue that is keeping the fight between Manny and Floyd from taking place. Espinoza has no doubts in his mind that Mayweather would take the fight with Pacquiao immediately.
Espinoza could be right. If Pacquiao was with Golden Boy Promotions are some other promotional company instead of Top Rank, he’d probably agree to take the fight with him in a heartbeat. After all, it’s a fight that would give Mayweather a huge payday if he could get it. We just saw in his last fight against Saul “Canelo” Alvarez that Mayweather isn’t afraid to take on a tough opponent, if it means that he’s going to get a big payday out of the fight.
Former WBC light heavyweight champion Jean Pascal feels that WBO 175 lb. champion Sergey Kovalev (23-0-1, 21 KO’s) should be seen as an untested fighter until he beats an actual world champion to prove himself. To Pascal, he doesn’t know how good Kovalev is because he’s never been in with an opponent to where he could evaluate his talent level. Right now Pascal sees Kovalev as still having a question mark over his head about how good he is until he faces his first test at light heavyweight.
There had been talk of Roy Jones Jr. fighting former UFC middleweight champion Anderson Silva in a boxing match in what likely would have been a terrible mismatch due to Jones’ superior skills. However, the chances of a fight between Silva and Jones Jr. would seem remote at best at this time following Anderson Silva’s gruesome left leg injury he suffered last night against UFC middleweight champion Chris Weidman in UFC 168 in Las Vegas, Nevada. Silva attempted a leg kick with his left leg, but Weidman blocked it with his left knee causing Silva’s left shin to fold in two. 
While Manny Pacquiao’s close adviser Michael Koncz met with Top Rank promoter Bob Arum this past week to discuss the two names – Tim Bradley and Ruslan Provodnikov – that Arum has for Pacquiao’s next bout April 12th in Las Vegas, Nevada, Pacquiao is still very much interested in fighting Floyd Mayweather Jr. That’s his first choice of who he’d like to fight, but unfortunately Mayweather’s not on Arum’s list of opponents for him to fight. It’s going to be one of Arum’s Top Rank fighters that Pacquiao faces next.
British fight promoter Frank Warren listed a number of fights that he would like to see take place in 2014, and one which is potential math-up between James DeGale (17-1, 11 KO’s) and the unbeaten middleweight #4 WBO, #11 IBF, #11 WBC, #15 WBA, Billy Joe Saunders (19-0, 10 KO’s). Warren sees this as a good fight that would do well in the UK in terms of making money and pleasing the fans. 
IBF cruiserweight champion Yoan Pablo Hernandez (28-1, 14 KO’s) will be back in action on March 8th against an opponent still to be determined in Stuttgart, Germany, according to Fightnews. Hernandez, 29, is coming off of a 10th round knockout win over Alexander Alekseev last month in Bamberg, Germany. Hernandez knocked Alekseev down three times in the fight before the bout was eventually halted in the 3rd. 
Unbeaten British giant Tyson Fury is ready to put a largely frustrating and unproductive 2013 behind him and enjoy a “big” 2014. Fury, who last fought in April of 2013 (getting up from an early knockdown to halt Steve Cunningham in New York) saw long months of his upwardly mobile career go down the drain due to his British super-fight with David Haye falling apart not once but twice.
Amir Khan’s trainer Virgil Hunter doesn’t see anything wrong with Khan’s ability to take hard shots at all. In fact, he credits him with the ability to get up from shots that would put other fights down and unable to get up from the knockdown. For this reason, Hunter thinks that Khan is a very good option for Floyd Mayweather Jr’s next fight on May 3rd. Hunter thinks Khan will get up from pretty much any knockdown because of his recuperative powers.
WBO welterweight champion Tim Bradley (31-0, 12 KO’s) really lucked out last year when he was given a controversial 12 round split decision over Manny Pacquiao (55-5-2, 38 KO’s) in Las Vegas, Nevada. Few people believe that Bradley won that fight, and he’s seen by many fans as a paper champion because of the win that was given to him.
The issue is no longer between Pacquiao and Mayweather or between Top Rank and Golden Boy Promotions. It has come to a point that the “unbeaten” boxer has to contend with the entire boxing world excluding puppets.