By Edward Chaykovsky
Hall of Fame trainer Freddie Roach is getting ready for a long training camp with eight division world champion Manny Pacquiao (57-6-2, 38KOs).
The Filipino superstar will face Timothy Bradley (33-1-1, 13KOs) for a third time on April 9th from the MGM Grand in Las Vegas.
Pacquiao says the upcoming fight will be the final bout of his professional career before he goes full-time with his political career in the Philippines.
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Bradley won a controversial twelve round split decision over Pacquiao in 2012. Pacquiao evened things up with a decisive unanimous decision over Bradley in their 2014 rematch.
For the trilogy fight, Bradley will have new trainer Teddy Atlas in his corner. Bradley parted ways with career-trainer Joel Diaz last September.
Roach strongly feels that Atlas will bring nothing to the upcoming fight. He cares even less for the motivational speeches that Atlas gives his fighters between rounds, and the veteran trainer was unimpressed with Bradley's knockout win over Brandon Rios last November. That was the first fight where Atlas was the head trainer for Bradley.
"Well, he wasn’t in there against an in shape fighter that wanted to win the fight, his opponent [Rios] just didn’t show up. I know that Teddy Atlas is not afraid of firemen or something like that, or not afraid of fire, and I don’t really give a sh*t about all his stories," Roach told On The Ropes Boxing Radio.
"Let’s face it, Teddy knows when he’s on film and he goes into the acting mode. He’s quiet and then all of the sudden he puts his voice on and starts saying, 'Oh we’re not afraid of firemen, we train in the heat.' What the f*** do you think we do? We are not scared of Teddy Atlas, he will bring nothing to the table, Bradley is Bradley."
