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This weekend’s bout between Floyd Mayweather and Zab Judah at the Thomas and Mack Center in Las Vegas is being billed 'Sworn Enemies' but you have some reservations about just how real this recent hatred and vitriol is between the two given their past friendship.


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It's not out of the realm of possibility that after these two scrap in Saturday night’s main event that they will give each other a man-hug, some dap and say it was all in the name of the promotion. You can even envision them sipping Cristal together afterwards at a local hot spot.

This duo doesn't exactly remind you of Harry Greb and Mickey Walker who legend has it extended their fight to a local bar after they had squared off against each other earlier.

You can almost guarantee that a diplomatic boxing match won’t occur when Jorge Arce and Rosendo Alvarez face off in a flyweight grudge match on their undercard. Last month at a media junket in Los Angeles, Arce, in his ever-improving English would tell the gathered audience what Alvarez could do to himself (since we're a family website we won't repeat Arce's epithet.)

But it's clear, these two really (no, seriously) don't like each other, which is unusual for Arce, usually a good-natured sort who goes into the ring with a smile and a sucker in his mouth.

"He's the first one I really have disliked," he would admit to MaxBoxing through Top Rank publicist Ricardo Jimenez on Tuesday afternoon.

The genesis of this feud goes back to their days as 108-pound titlists a few years ago. While they both had belts (Arce the WBC, Alvarez the WBA) a unification battle never took place.

"The thing was," explained Arce, "we were both champions and he was saying I was dodging him, that I wouldn't fight him. Being that he's with King and I'm with Arum, those fights were hard to make. It wasn't my doing. He was talking that I didn't want to fight him, so that's where it all comes from."

The animosity even extends to fights that don't directly involve the hard-nosed Nicaraguan. During a six-week stretch in mid-December to late January, Arce would defeat Adonis Rivas in two entertaining affairs in Mexico. First he would halt Rivas in ten and then in the rematch he would make Rivas quit on his stool in the sixth frame of their return engagement.

Rivas is managed by Alvarez.

It was on that late January night in Cancun that Arce-Alvarez nearly took place.

"He had been saying a lot of things about me, Rivas was talking about me, too," said Arce, recalling that eventful evening. "So when he quit on his stool and he was sitting down there on the second fight in his corner, I went up to his corner and said, 'Get up!! Fight like a man!!!' He'd been talking and now he didn't want to fight. Then Rosendo told me to get out of his way, move on.

"So I told him, 'Rosendo, you're the next guy to get the same thing' He was the guy that threw the first punch."

Fortunately, the situation didn't go off like Pop Rocks and cola. As cooler heads prevailed, the impetus was there to make this match-up a reality.

"They drove me nuts," said Arum, Arce's long-time promoter, of the pressure he was under to make this fight a reality. "We had to go to King and pay really good money because that's who he wanted to fight."

As the fight was consummated as part of the Mayweather-Judah undercard, Arce was aroused by the news.

"I definitely got very excited about it because he'd been talking so much, saying this and that," Arce said. "Now, I'm really looking forward to fighting him and teaching him a lesson."

Arce – who's as colorful as a box of Crayolas – is never a stranger to 'Fight of the Year'-type bouts. This should be no different, especially given the emotions surrounding this fight.

"I definitely enjoy this kind of thing because it's an extra boost it gives you," he says of the ill-will between the two." You go into the fight, when you get hit you want to get them back a lot worse. It's more exciting, it's a more emotional fight. It's better when I feel something for the opponent than when I don't. I think sometimes you get in there and it's dangerous to fight a guy you really don't care about."

His next bout may come as a junior bantamweight.

"I think this may be my last fight [at 112 pounds]," Arce admitted.

Arum has talked openly of matching him with WBA 115-pound titlist Martin Castillo in the near future.

"I don't think there's anybody at 108 that I really want to fight. I think I want to jump to 115 right on my next fight and hopefully jump to 118."

But first he has some personal business to take care off against Alvarez.

"He really doesn't like this guy," Arum says. "It's more ‘sworn enemies’ [with] him against Alvarez than Judah and Mayweather."

DIRECT SERIES

Top Rank, which is in the midst of perhaps it's busiest year, has recently completed a deal with DirecTV, that begins in April 29th.

"It's for four pay-per-view shows from Puerto Rico which are going to be sold on pay-per-view on the island and also DirecTV in the United States," explained Arum.

Ivan Calderon is slated to defend his WBO junior flyweight title on the inaugural edition along with a scrap between Cesar Bazan and Henry Bruseles