SACRAMENTO, CALIFORNIA—Recession or not, there was no embarrassment of empty seats at the MGM Grand in Las Vegas on the night Manny Pacquiao turned the “Dream Match” into a nightmare for Oscar De La Hoya.

And now comes the pay-per-view (PPV) figures. And there’s no disgrace in the numbers either.

Oscar’s fighting prowess may have been anywhere but in the ring Saturday evening. But his sheer box-office fire, made more ablaze by the most credible and deadly of opponents in the Filipino ring icon, translated into 1.25 million PPV buys on cable giant HBO.

At $54.95 per, revenues add up to about $70 million (P3.34 billion) and make for a nice profit margin all around.

(The Philippine Daily Inquirer estimates that Pacquiao will earn a pre-tax windfall of $12 million from his PPV share).

The ringing from the HBO cash register is music to the promoters’ ears and certainly more than enough to soothe the Golden Boy’s battered body and ego.

De La Hoya-Pacquiao has also notched a record—it’s the first PPV boxing match this year to breach the one million mark.

HBO figures reported by Broadcastnewsroom.com, the industry portal, said the fight is only the fourth non-heavyweight event to reach one million buys. Incidentally, all four features De La Hoya.

Number one on this list is the 2006 De La Hoya-Floyd Mayweather Jr. fight, which drew 2.4 million buys, followed by the 1999 De La Hoya-Felix Trinidad and 2008 De La Hoya-Pacquiao fights (1.25 million buys) and the 2004 De La Hoya-Bernard Hopkins bout (1 million buys).

The portal also quoted Mark Taffet, the HBO chief for sports operations.

Taffet said: “De La Hoya-Pacquiao definitely exceeded our expectations. We hoped that fight would hit the million-buy mark, which is the barometer for mega fights in this sport, but we were uncertain given the state of the economy. We were really pleased that boxing fans everywhere showed tremendous support for the fight.”

Taffet paints a bright picture for Pacquiao, who attracted up to 400,000 buys for one of his fights. He also paid tribute to Manny’s huge potential to become a major PPV attraction in his own right.

Pacquiao has become a breakthrough PPV star, Taffet said.

The Dream Match numbers also indicate the Ultimate Fighting Championship has yet to reach full market potential.

Although a threat to boxing, the UFC’s PPV record still stands at 800,000 buys from the Brock Lesnar-Randy Couture fight last Nov. 15 also at the MGM Grand, reported Broadcastnews.com.

LOS ANGELES, California—Manny Pacquiao ducked under a simulated left jab and went for trainer Freddie Roach’s body with a spear-like punch. He stopped, pushed his coach away and said “sometimes…”

He then sidestepped and went for the head.

“Because sometimes, he jabs very slow, like this,” he told Roach, acting out De La Hoya’s tendencies.

Things are slowly shifting to wrap-up mode at the Wild Card Gym in Hollywood, where Pacquiao and Roach worked the mitts again Friday to polish up a game plan the Filipino ring icon will use against Oscar De La Hoya for their Dec. 6 “Dream Match” at the MGM Grand in Las Vegas.

A day after De La Hoya told Ring Magazine that he can’t lose that match, Team Pacquiao went through the motion of making sure no stone is left unturned once it makes its traditional road trip to the Nevada desert gambling haven on Monday.

The Filipino champ went through another rigorous day of training, where he again pushed hard and beyond the limits set by his trainers.

Aside from working the mitts, Pacquiao shadow-boxed, hit the double-end and speed ball, skipped rope, did crunches and also had his arms and abdomen whipped with a Thai stick by trainer Eric Brown.

Other Team Pacquiao personnel also did their jobs.

Reports had it that Team Pacquiao and the World Boxing Council, whose lightweight crown the Filipino holds, have already struck a compromise regarding unpaid sanction fees.

Roach, on the other hand, said he will continue to push the issue on hand-taping to make sure De La Hoya doesn’t have an advantage with the bandages he will be wearing underneath his gloves.
And Pacquiao may push through with testing his weight a week before the fight, even if the WBC is not sanctioning this bout.

Boxingscene.com reported that Pacquiao’s camp already paid the $30,000 it owed the WBC for sanctioning his fight against Juan Manuel Marquez last March, where the Pacman grabbed the Mexican’s super featherweight title.

The report also said the WBC and Pacquiao have already reached an agreement regarding the $100,000 fee the boxing body requested for the fight against De La Hoya.

Roach, meanwhile, said he is going to make sure the Nevada State Athletic Commission monitors the taping of De La Hoya’s hands to make sure the former six-division champion gets no undue advantage from them.

“(De La Hoya cutman) Joe (Chavez) uses strapping tape, which is not supposed to be used,” Roach said. “Between the knuckles, they use what Joe calls fake ligaments. They make it like a rope and then put it between the fingers and it’s actually in the rules, it says one strip per tape only.”

Boxers’ hands are often taped before wearing gloves to prevent them from getting injured and cushioning the impact of hard punches. Roach may sound like he’s nitpicking, but he may have a valid point.

Bandages used for hand-wrapping often get stiff once soaked in sweat. That means the thicker the bandages used for the wrapping, the stiffer they will be in the late rounds, adding zing to a boxer’s punches.

“I want it fair,” he said. “The rules are rules and that’s what we’re going by. I want them to be upheld.

Roach said he will try to monitor the taping. He will bring the issue up with the Nevada commission once Team Pacquiao hits Las Vegas.

Meanwhile, De La Hoya said he will try to finish off Pacquiao early in the match.

Congrats Pacman!

Pacquiao won at 9th round, knocking down Diaz. Manny’s super power never ceased. Not even a scratch, left Diaz bruise-faced and with a broken nose.

For the past years Manny awed us with his victories and championed in four different divisions.The Pacquiao-Diaz fight was his first on the Light Weight division. And he is the First Filipino to Championed in this division.

Diaz is undoubtedly the best in his category. But Pacquiao has proven himself, the unbeatable.