If a popularity contest were to be staged tomorrow in the Philippines, a staunchly Catholic nation of more than 100 million people, only Jesus himself would top the country's pugilistic icon, Emmanuel "Manny" Dapidran Pacquiao.
After May 2, should Pacquiao defeat Floyd Mayweather Jnr in the richest 36 minutes in the history of sport, you could make a decent case those rankings would be reversed. Pacquiao, already revered as a quasi-religious figure, would become a verified golden God. And Jesus, for all of his miracles, never did manage to become the undisputed welterweight champion of the world.
The status of Pacquiao among his fellow Filipinos is unfathomable to outsiders. When Pacquiao unleashes his wares in the ring – his hands contain superb power, delivered at devilish southpaw angles – the gears of the island chain grind to a halt. You would hear a pin drop, if anyone dared to glance away from the television and pick one up.
To imagine the collective anxiety of the nation in the moments before the opening bell at the MGM Grand, one of the sport's fabled Las Vegas cathedrals, is to imagine a million Melbourne Cups run all at once. At the age of 36, this represents Pacquiao's apex, just as it does for the undeniably slick Mayweather. There will be no rematch.
Both men have eventually stumbled their way to a superfight years in the making. Boxing, a sport boasting so many layers of intricate dysfunction that it now occupies its own special cultural wasteland, did its best to ensure it never happened. Yet here we stand, on the verge of the bout that could, for a time, return the fight game to an era when average punters genuinely cared.
The preamble has been typically chaotic. Earlier in the week, Pacquiao's promoter Bob Arum, the former lawyer who made his fortune on the back of Muhammad Ali, then the great middleweights of the 1980s (Hearns, Hagler, Duran, Leonard), cancelled a phone hook-up when his man had uttered just a handful of words.
"This is ridiculous," Arum would snort. It's a word that aptly describes the insane sums of money at stake, with the fight set to bring in a total revenue, once gate takings and television pay-per-view receipts are counted, in excess of $US400 million ($520 million).
Under the arrangements of the deal, Mayweather stands to earn more than $US150 million, ensuring he remains on top of the Forbes list of the world's richest athletes. Pacquiao's cut will be at least $US100 million.
Buried under sickly mountains of dirty cash are the combatants, who remain a study in contrasts. Mayweather has been happy to play the villain, as he has done for much of his flawless career, which has yielded 47 wins from as many professional fights; victories built on his wonderful ring craft and predictive defence that suggest he is part-Jedi.
He is brash, ostentatious with his fortune and has little appeal as a character in general. He claims to be better than Ali, when most boxing experts don't rate him in their all-time top 10s. Earlier in the year, he was banned from entering Australia due to his numerous convictions for violence against women.
Pacquiao, when he hasn't been compiling his impressive 57-5 ring resume, spends his time building hospitals out of his own funds, singing karaoke, playing pro basketball (he's 169 centimetres) and being a member of the Philippines House of Representatives, elected in 2010 and then returned, unopposed, in 2013.
Many see him as a future president and for all of his financial clout, he has never veered far away from narratives around his own rise from extreme poverty. He left home at 14, living on the streets of Manila before boxing would sweep him towards superstardom. His first professional fight, a four-round unanimous decision against Edmund Enting Ignatio, would earn him the equivalent of $3.
He eats sparingly while reading verses from the Bible. And his extensive entourage, which can stretch into the 300s, sleep on every square inch of his palatial suites. Freddie Roach, his old-school trainer who suffers from Parkinson's Disease, never, ever approves.
Neither man "deserves" to win this fight more than the other. Yet if the question was asked, who had more at stake, it would be a unanimous decision. Mayweather's precious record remains his obsession. It's no cliche to suggest that on his shoulders, Pacquiao carries the heart of a nation.
