Mailbag: Floyd and Pacman take similar path

http://http://sports.yahoo.com/box/news;_ylt=ApWk5KllHJTe1ATezRAVtSeUxLYF?slug=ki-iole_mayweather_pacquiao_careers092011 Mailbag: Floyd and Pacman take similar path Floyd Mayweather Jr. has repeatedly intimated that Manny Pacquiao’s rise through boxing’s weight classes is due to something other than natural growth. But the statistics do not back Mayweather’s contention. Mayweather is 21 months older than Pacquiao, but looking at what they weighed when they were the same age, they are remarkably close. For the sake of the argument, let’s pick up the discussion for each man when they were 24. Mayweather turned 24 on Feb. 24, 2001. His first fight after that date was on May 26, 2001, in Grand Rapids, Mich., when he fought Carlos Hernandez. Mayweather weighed in for that bout at 130. Pacquiao turned 24 on Dec. 17, 2002. His first fight after that date was on March 15, 2003, against Serikzhan Yeshmagambetov, in Manila. Pacquiao weighed 126, or only one class lighter than Mayweather. When they were 26, Mayweather was at 134 and Pacquiao at 129 1/2. At 30, Mayweather was 150 to fight Oscar De La Hoya, while Pacquiao was 138 to face Ricky Hatton. Although, in Pacquiao’s bout prior to Hatton, he weighed 142 when he fought De La Hoya just 11 days before his 30th birthday. By the time each man turned 32, they were both welterweights. It’s not like there has been a great disparity in size between them. Another argument Mayweather made last week in insinuating Pacquiao is using performance-enhancing drugs has been his dramatic improvement. At the post-fight news conference, Mayweather said, “Like I said before, we knew Sugar Ray Leonard we knew he was great from his Olympic days. We knew he was going to be a great professional. Michael Jordan, from college, we knew he was going to be a great professional. Floyd Mayweather, from the beginning of his career, from the ’90s, we knew he was going to be a great professional. “Look at all these different athletes. Kobe Bryant in high school, you knew he was going to be a great athlete. Now, you ask yourself, a fighter just don’t get 25 and all of a sudden become great. A fighter don’t just become 25 years old and pop out of nowhere. You know what? ‘I’m knocking junior middleweights out. I’m knocking middleweights out.’ That just don’t happen. That just don’t happen.” That argument doesn’t hold water, either. Pacquiao won his first world title, the World Boxing Council flyweight belt, on April 24, 1999, when he was 20. Mayweather won his first belt, the WBC super featherweight title, by stopping Genaro Hernandez on Oct. 3, 1998, when he was 21. By the time he was 26, Pacquiao had won world titles at flyweight and super bantamweight and drew in a spectacular bout with Juan Manuel Marquez for the featherweight title. Pacquiao had won the linear featherweight title by that point, when he defeated Marco Antonio Barrera a month before his 25th birthday, though he received no belt. By the time Mayweather was 26, he had won two world titles, the WBC super featherweight and the WBC lightweight titles. And Pacquiao’s rise in the last decade was aided tremendously by coming to the U.S. and hiring Freddie Roach to be his trainer. The point is, Pacquiao’s rise to prominence does not on the surface raise suspicions that he’s used, or is using, performance-enhancing drugs. I don’t believe Mayweather is afraid of Pacquiao, as so many Pacquiao sycophants insist. I do believe, however, that he despises Pacquiao promoter Bob Arum so much that he is willing to skip the fight in order to keep Arum from profiting from what would be the most lucrative fight in boxing history. Hopefully, the fight happens because the prospect of it has the world captivated. So far, though, Mayweather’s arguments as to why it’s not happening are falling on deaf ears.