Mayweather-Pacquiao fight tickets to go on sale to public next week

Tickets for the Floyd Mayweather Jr.-Manny Pacquiao fight are scheduled to go on sale to the public “by the end of next week,” Leonard Ellerbe of Mayweather Promotions said Tuesday.

Fans have clamored to get their hands on seats for the anticipated May 2 welterweight title unification bout since it was first announced a month ago.

It’ll be a desperate pursuit.

Promotional executives familiar with ticket plans but unauthorized to discuss them publicly have told the Los Angeles Times that less than 1,000 tickets will be available to the public through Ticketmaster.

The remaining tickets have been divided among MGM Grand, Mayweather Promotions and Pacquiao’s promoter, Top Rank, with most of those seats bound for after-market sales.

Top Rank Chairman Bob Arum said the MGM Grand has been configured for 16,200 seats, with the live-gate based on face-value ticket prices to be between $72 million and $73 million -- more than triple the prior boxing record and greater than what the latest Super Bowl in Arizona generated (an estimated $60 million).

The cheapest Mayweather-Pacquiao seats are expected to be $1,500. Floor seats, according to two officials, are currently listed at $10,000, after first being mentioned at $5,000.

Interest in the fight pitting the unbeaten Mayweather and record eight-division champion Pacquiao is fervent, beyond even what promoters expected.

That’s being seen in foreign broadcast and sponsorship deals.

On Tuesday, it was announced that Sky Sports Box Office had won bidding to broadcast the fight to 20 million customers on pay-per-view in the United Kingdom, Germany, Italy, Ireland and Austria.

“There’s a definite appetite for this fight globally … everywhere, it’s robust,” Top Rank President Todd duBoef said. “Sky Sports has a history of putting up real results on pay-per-view, and they were fortunate enough to secure those rights.”

The foreign deals in other countries, such as Mexico and the Philippines, are for general network circulation.

Another individual familiar with the foreign television market said the television rights deal negotiated in Pacquiao’s home country, the Philippines, is the richest among all foreign deals, at $10 million.

In Mexico, the official, not authorized to speak publicly on the matter, said rival networks Televisa and Azteca have agreed to jointly broadcast the fight, spending more than $2 million on a fight weekend that coincides with Cinco de Mayo celebrations.

Tecate last week agreed to a record beer sponsorship deal for a fight, $5.6 million.