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| Manny Pacquiao © Gallo Images |
Manny Pacquiao will earn about $22 million for beating Miguel Cotto in their welterweight fight in Las Vegas. Cotto will make about $12 million.
That converts to R167 million for Paquiao and R91 million for Cotto.
The fight, which Pacquaio won on a 12th-round stoppage, generated 1.25 million pay-per-view buys that brought in $70 million (just over R530 million) it was announced by Home Box Office Sports in New York on Saturday.
It was the second time that a Pacquiao bout generated more than one million pay-per-view buys, further proof that the Filipino superstar, who trains in a Hollywood gym, is a box-office smash.
The numbers increase the urgency for all parties to get together on a clash between Pacquiao and American Floyd Mayweather Jr, whose bout against Juan Manuel Marquez generated 1.05 million pay-per-view purchases in September.
Promoter Bob Arum said Pacquiao-Mayweather could fuel a resurgence of interest in the sport.
"The way I look at it now, boxing is really on a roll," Arum said. "We would be idiots now to slow the momentum. The only way we can keep the momentum is to make this fight."
Arum said he was ready to put the fight together. The likely division would be the welterweight class.
Pacquiao won the WBO welterweight belt that Cotto had held. The technical knockout by Pacquiao marked his seventh
world title in as many different weight classes.
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