There wasn’t any anger in Bob Arum’s voice as he discussed Teofimo Lopez’s decision to reject an intriguing contest against Subriel Matias.

The 93-year-old promoter appeared perplexed more than anything while assessing Lopez’s predicament during an interview with The Ring.

Arum wasn’t exactly enthusiastic about putting Lopez-Matias on ESPN’s pay-per-view platform, but that was the economic model required when Arum’s Top Rank Inc., Lopez’s career-long promoter, constructed a compensation package for Lopez (21-1, 13 KOs) to defend his Ring and WBO junior welterweight titles against Puerto Rico’s Matias (21-2, 21 KOs) on March 15 in Las Vegas.

Brooklyn-born Lopez, 27, revealed later last week on social media that he made a counteroffer after turning down Top Rank’s proposal in accordance with a deadline late last Tuesday night. Lopez didn’t disclose the terms of his proposal, but Arum informed The Ring the two-division world champion would’ve earned a career-high purse for meeting Matias in two months had he accepted Top Rank’s terms.

“We offered him a tremendous amount above his minimum,” Arum said, “his biggest purse ever, and the opportunity to earn even more if somehow the pay-per-view took off. And he turned that down. So, the question is what won’t he turn down? I mean, where is his head at? We really should, instead of just continuing to propose fighters for him to fight, he can let us know who he wants to fight.”

Lopez wasn’t especially enthused about boxing Matias because the former IBF junior welterweight champion has been beaten twice. Matias, 32, is a powerful puncher, but Australian southpaw Liam Paro out-boxed and unanimously out-pointed him to take the abovementioned IBF belt from him last June 15 at Juan Abreu Coliseum in Manati, Puerto Rico.

Former undisputed lightweight titleholder Devin Haney (31-0, 15 KOs, 1 NC) is an appealing potential opponent for Lopez.

Haney has his sights set, however, on what would be a lucrative rematch with Ryan Garcia (24-1, 20 KOs, 1 NC) once Garcia completes a one-year suspension on April 20 for failing a performance-enhancing drug test following his 12-round, majority-decision victory over Haney, later changed to a no-contest. Lopez-Garcia would also be a marketable matchup once Garcia is eligible to be licensed again.

Haney is The Ring’s No. 1 contender for Lopez’s 140-pound championship. The suspended Garcia isn’t ranked in any division by The Ring at present.

“Who does he wanna fight?,” Arum said of Lopez. “We gave him [WBO champ] Brian Norman at one point, to go up to welterweight. We gave him a whole group of fighters. And it’s not like he’s coming off great performances. He looked terrible with [Jamaine] Ortiz and people thought he lost that fight [last February 8], a lotta people thought that, although I thought he won it.

“And then he fought [Steve] Claggett, who’s not ‘Superman,’ and he wasn’t able to destroy Claggett [on June 29]. So again, I don’t know what effort he is willing to put in anymore, and I don’t know where his head is at. But, you know, he’ll come around and tell us who he wants to fight and, if we can arrange it, we’ll do it.”