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Miguel Cotto (35-2, 28 KO’s) is hoping to get a rematch with Manny Pacquiao if his fight with Floyd Mayweather Jr. doesn’t take place. Cotto, 29, defeated Yuri Foreman on June 5th to capture the world Boxing Association junior middleweight title. This was certainly a good comeback fight for Cotto, because he had been taken apart by Pacquiao in a 12th round knockout loss in November of last year.
While it’s nice that Cotto was able to beat Foreman after he injured his right knee in the fight in the 7th, but it would be better if Cotto proved that he’s not a shot fighter by facing someone a little more offensively talented than Foreman. I think Cotto would go a long ways towards proving that he deserves a rematch with Pacquiao if Cotto could at the very least beat someone like Antonio Margarito.
Cotto already has a loss to Margarito and it was a brutal defeat. If Cotto could step up to the plate, fight Margarito and prove that he’s good enough to beat him, then I would feel that Cotto somewhat deserved a rematch with Pacquiao. I still think Cotto would need at least two more wins over talented fighters before I think he would be truly deserving of a rematch with Pacquiao, because Foreman just doesn’t do it for me because he fights for the same promotional company, has no offense, no power and pretty much handicapped by his injury at the midpoint in the fight.
That win is tarnished in my view because of the injury. A win over Margarito would help a little, but not as much as you would think because Margarito hasn’t looked good in his last two fights against Shane Mosley and Ricardo Garcia. Margarito looks nothing like the same fighter he was back in 2008. Something seems to have changed with him after his win over Cotto.
I think the worse thing that could happen is Cotto being matched up against Pacquiao immediately with only the Foreman fight separating his loss to Pacquiao. It’s far too soon for Cotto and Pacquiao to fight again. If they fight now, it’s going to look like a money grab on their part by fighting so soon without any reason. If Cotto had least been competitive with Pacquiao then you could make a case for there needing to be a rematch. But the fight wasn’t even remotely competitive, which makes it seem so wrong to have a rematch now just so Pacquiao can try and win an 8th world title.
I don’t really care either way if Pacquiao wants to collect another trinket to put on his wall but it would be nice if he chose someone else rather than Cotto again. I still wouldn’t mind seeing Pacquiao face Cotto some day, but only after Cotto fights a handful of fighters and beats them. And I don’t want to see Cotto only fighting guys from his same promotional company while in the process of building up to a rematch with Pacquiao. That seems kind of weird and I just don’t trust those match-ups.
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