Big fight that is not worth the wait

Did he jump in voluntarily? Or was Floyd Mayweather pushed into this long-awaited showdown against Manny Pacquiao?

If you know the answer to this question, you will have a good idea of who is going to win.

Mayweather's bottom line, apart from money, has been avoiding opponents who might beat him. And if he is now choosing Pacquiao, then expect him to win.

Their contest in Las Vegas on May 2 is expected to be the sport's highest-grossing fight of all time, but was Mayweather pushed into it by the television executives who have not been overly impressed with his declining pay-per-view sales of late?

Equally, it is not unusual for boxers to study their opponents and wait for the right moment to strike.

That is what Gene Tunney did to Jack Dempsey, although his task was made easier by the world heavyweight champion, who had not participated in a competitive fight for three years.

Dempsey was still the favourite. When his entourage learned that Tunney liked to read Shakespeare, they believed the result was a foregone conclusion.

How wrong they were. Tunney brought science, youth and stamina into the fight and he emerged victorious on points. Dempsey, only 31 at the time, was past his best.

The art of analysing and then plotting to topple champions is as old as time itself. Buster Douglas and Evander Holyfield did that to Mike Tyson, Sugar Ray Leonard to Wilfred Benitez, Ken Norton to Muhammad Ali, and so on.

They did not wait until the subjects of their scrutiny were candidates for old-age homes.

It should not have taken Mayweather this long to study Pacman, who had an unlucky points defeat to Tim Bradley and then suffered a devastating knockout loss to Juan Manuel Marquez.

Was Mayweather waiting for Father Time to hand Pacquiao a few more knocks? Or was he waiting for the right price to step into the ring?

It was probably the latter, but in that case, no boxing fan should accept that this fight - which analysts believe could be worth around $250-million - will involve two warriors at their peak.

It is a business decision.

The fact that Pacquiao is already hinting about retiring after the fight is a concern; he should be talking about knocking out Mayweather. Nothing else.

I fear that, pound-for-pound, this bout is not going to live up to the classics like the Fight of the Century between unbeaten kings Ali and Joe Frazier, or the middleweight war between Marvin Hagler and Tommy Hearns.

The odds are good that fans are going to get short-changed to some degree.

What Mayweather and Pacquiao deserve is for fans to boycott the fight - the overpriced tickets and pay-per-view.

Let them klap each other silly in an empty house, and then us fans can watch the replay a week or so later.

We have waited five years for this fight - and it should be worth less now - so would waiting another week really hurt?

I know that will not happen, largely because I will probably be waking up early myself to watch.

But let us be honest about this.

These two toppies did not give us what we wanted when they were at their peaks. Yet we are prepared to shower them with the money they want.