• Manny Pacquiao losing money by stepping in the ring with De La Hoya

Manny Pacquiao is gearing up for his Saturday super fight with Oscar De La Hoya. Paraphrasing trainer Freddie Roach, Pacquiao is in great shape and is going to whoop Oscar’s ass.

The training and gaining weight have gone well for Manny but there’s another issue surrounding the fight that has him concerned.. Cheap people asking Manny to give them tickets for the fight. I’m not talking about folks with no money; these are actors, actresses, and politicians.

From the Cebu Daily News:

The running total for superstar Manny Pacquiao’s expenses for freeloaders who have asked him for tickets for his December 6 showdown with Oscar De la Hoya has now reached $640,000 or a staggering P32 million.

The figure was taken as of last Thursday, and it seems that can breach the $700,000 mark by fight night.

Pacquiao was visibly upset over the figure, which he and chief of staff Joe Ramos kept reviewing in the presence of this writer inside Pacquiao’s unit at the Palazzo, the upscale residence of Hollywood actors, actresses and celebrities.

Mo’ money mo’ problems. Manny’s expected to pull around $15 mil for the fight, but that doesn’t mean he should be shouldering the load for a bunch of jock sniffers. Especially with the state of the global economy. The financial crisis has the fight’s promoters downsizing their expectations for PPV buys from topping the 2.15 million buys for the De La Hoya-Mayweather fight, to 1.5 million. Don’t get it twisted. They’re still gonna make a boatload of money, just not as much as they thought they were four months ago.