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By Jake Donovan - It's now official. No matter your criteria for ranking fighters in a pound-for-pound sense, there's no dis*****g that Manny Pacquiao is the best fighter in the world.
Say what you want about David Diaz – he was "just" a paper titlist, the weakest titlist of the division, not even close to being the best lightweight, and so on. Forget for a moment that there was even a title at stake in Saturday night's pay-per-view headliner. What folks shouldn't lose sight of is, ten years after capturing the linear flyweight title, Manny Pacquiao dominated a legitimate Top 5 lightweight, averaging close to 90 punches per round in a complete performance, capped by a highlight reel knockout.
There's no need to sip from the same fountain that's selling the Filipino as a world titlist in four separate weight classes based off of Saturday night's win. Any true student of the game can tell you Manny already turned that trick the moment he beat Juan Manuel Marquez three months ago for the junior lightweight crown. The title trivia is merely for those too lazy to follow the bouncing ball of championships with actual history behind it.
In a true title lineage sense, Manny Pacquiao is a former three-division champ (flyweight, featherweight, junior lightweight) and has now win trinkets in two others (junior featherweight and now lightweight). While then-junior featherweight titlist Lehlo Ledwaba wasn't the linear champ, he was regarded by many at the time as the division's best fighter, which would give Pacquiao such a win in four separate weight classes.
Now that he's emphatically reminded the world of who's the best fighter in the world, the only remaining question is if he's ready to define himself as the world's best lightweight.
For the moment, the answer appears to be no. Not that Pacquaio isn't capable of handling himself against the Nate Campbell's and Joel Casamayor's of the world, among many others in a loaded lightweight division. But if we are to take promoter Bob Arum's word at face value – and perhaps yesterday he was just lying and today he'll have a different version of what he considers the truth – then defenses against top junior lightweights moving up and more Pacquiao division jumping is in the immediate future of the Filipino phenom. [details]
Say what you want about David Diaz – he was "just" a paper titlist, the weakest titlist of the division, not even close to being the best lightweight, and so on. Forget for a moment that there was even a title at stake in Saturday night's pay-per-view headliner. What folks shouldn't lose sight of is, ten years after capturing the linear flyweight title, Manny Pacquiao dominated a legitimate Top 5 lightweight, averaging close to 90 punches per round in a complete performance, capped by a highlight reel knockout.
There's no need to sip from the same fountain that's selling the Filipino as a world titlist in four separate weight classes based off of Saturday night's win. Any true student of the game can tell you Manny already turned that trick the moment he beat Juan Manuel Marquez three months ago for the junior lightweight crown. The title trivia is merely for those too lazy to follow the bouncing ball of championships with actual history behind it.
In a true title lineage sense, Manny Pacquiao is a former three-division champ (flyweight, featherweight, junior lightweight) and has now win trinkets in two others (junior featherweight and now lightweight). While then-junior featherweight titlist Lehlo Ledwaba wasn't the linear champ, he was regarded by many at the time as the division's best fighter, which would give Pacquiao such a win in four separate weight classes.
Now that he's emphatically reminded the world of who's the best fighter in the world, the only remaining question is if he's ready to define himself as the world's best lightweight.
For the moment, the answer appears to be no. Not that Pacquaio isn't capable of handling himself against the Nate Campbell's and Joel Casamayor's of the world, among many others in a loaded lightweight division. But if we are to take promoter Bob Arum's word at face value – and perhaps yesterday he was just lying and today he'll have a different version of what he considers the truth – then defenses against top junior lightweights moving up and more Pacquiao division jumping is in the immediate future of the Filipino phenom. [details]
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