By Edward Chaykovsky
Former champion Brandon Rios is not convinced that Manny Pacquiao has been able to regain that "killer instinct." A few years ago, Pacquiao brutalized opponents in the ring and punished them into submission. Since the stoppage victory over Miguel Cotto in the fall of 2009, Pacquiao has been unable to put away his opponents inside the distance.
Rios fought Pacquiao in 2013 and lost virtually every round of the fight, but he never felt threatened by Pacquiao in the ring. And Rios wasn't moved by Pacquiao's last fight with Chris Algieri, who the Filipino boxer dropped six times but couldn't put him away.
"Pacquiao seemed that he had let off the gas a little bit, to me it feels like he doesn’t have that killer instinct. With me, when he was fighting me, I thought he would just take me out or knock me out when he had me hurt, if he had me hurt. I thought he would just put a little more pressure on to it. Same thing with Bradley and Algieri, he did drop Algieri but I think the old Pacquiao would have gone out there and finished him or the old Pacquiao would have gone out there and killed him," Rios told On The Ropes Boxing Radio .
"I don’t know if it’s because he found God and he doesn’t feel like he wants to hurt people — which I’m not saying is a bad thing, everybody has their belief and I do respect the lord but in that ring, you’re trying to hurt your opponent because I know the opponent is gonna try to hurt me, that’s how I see it."
