As far as Manny Pacquiao is concerned, he is "100% confident" his rematch with Floyd Mayweather Jr. is still on for Sept. 19 at The Sphere in Las Vegas, regardless of what the latter has said about the event recently.
Mayweather told Vegas Sports Today in early April that "we don't know the location of the fight. The Sphere is one of the places that they talked about. So, we don't know if it's 100% going to be there. And this is not actually a fight. It's an exhibition."
Pacquiao said he took issue with Mayweather's characterization of the rematch of one of the biggest boxing fights of the century, set to stream on Netflix.
"When I heard Mayweather say it was an exhibition, I called my team right away and asked, ‘What's happening? What's wrong with this guy?" Pacquiao told ESPN. "What we signed was a real fight, not an exhibition. I don't know where he got this idea from or where his head was at, but the fight is a real fight, and it absolutely won't be an exhibition."
Mayweather and Pacquiao initially fought in 2015 after years of buildup, achieving over 4.5 million pay-per-view buys, with Mayweather winning by unanimous decision.
Now 48 and 47 years old, respectively, the pair will battle in the first-ever professional boxing match at The Sphere.
"We both signed the contract and we both got our advance on our purses, so there's no way we're going to cancel this fight," Pacquiao told ESPN. "Even with our first fight, he's a lot to deal with, but the fight happened."
The CEO of Manny Pacquiao Promotions, Jas Mathur, said Mayweather's comments referring to the Sept. 19 event as an exhibition were in breach of contract but that the two sides were "making headway" toward resolving the issues, per ESPN.
"We are 100% confident that the overall outcome from this situation will turn out positive," Mathur told ESPN on Monday. "We're gaining progress and traction. Floyd has to live up to his obligations, and I think he wants this fight to happen, too."
Pacquiao retired from boxing in September 2021 as the only eight-division world champion in boxing history before coming out of retirement last year for a WBC welterweight title fight against Mario Barrios, which ended in a majority draw.
Mayweather, who has a perfect 50-0 career record and won 15 world titles, hasn't competed competitively since his highly controversial boxing match against UFC legend Conor McGregor in August of 2017. He has said he will have an exhibition fight against another boxing legend, Mike Tyson, this spring -- although no date has been set -- and announced in February that he would be coming out of retirement after that bout.
--Field Level Media
