Tweet
http://www.boxing.com/pacquiao_plans...the_world.html
"One thing we have an agreement on is that we’re not here just to make money, just to fight nobodies. We’re here to be the best…”
Four years ago, multi-division world champ Manny Pacquiao had just cashed in on the monster payday against Floyd Mayweather he had been pursuing for years and was claiming a bum shoulder that would not only excuse the loss to his archrival, but also ease him into a dignified retirement.
Things didn’t quite end up with him on a rocking chair, tending to Filipino business as a full-time Senator and ex-boxer, though.
Long-time promoter Bob Arum ran Pacquiao out to the ring three more times post-Mayweather, the third time being the well-expected screw job loss that removed the WBO belt from around his waist and allowed for Arum to eventually transfer some of the Filipino icon’s mojo to Terence Crawford by way of sloppy mauler Jeff Horn.
This would’ve been a second ideal jumping-off point into retirement for Manny. Victimized by the business that had served him so well, there would’ve been a degree of poetic justice in being devoured the way he was by Arum and Horn on Horn’s Australian home turf.
But, no. Pacquiao still felt like he had something left and went about proving it.
A seven-round destruction of Lucas Matthysse as a promotional free agent and a dominant decision win over Adrien Broner in his first fight under the Premier Boxing Champions (PBC) banner proved that he was not done and that, at the very least, he was still a top five or six welterweight.
And now he’s set to meet Keith Thurman on July 20 in a bout that could send him straight into the top three and, at 40 years of age, turn his focus from proving that he belongs to proving that he’s the very best.
“One thing we have an agreement on is that we’re not here just to make money, just to fight nobodies,” trainer Freddie Roach recently told Fight Hub TV. “We’re here to be the best. I mean, that’s why we’re fighting. After this fight we want to fight the best guy out there. I mean we’re kinda hunting for Mayweather a little bit, yes. We’d like that one back one more time, yes. But if it doesn’t come and Errol Spence does, well I mean, that could definitely be our next fight, or [Terence] Crawford or—there’s a lot of guys out there that are very good at 147. So, I mean, there’s some good competition.”
Roach is famous for hyping Manny’s abilities and exploits to ridiculous levels, but he sees flaws in all of the major welterweights ranked ahead of his fighter and feels Manny’s strengths play into those weaknesses.
“You know,” Roach said, “Spence just let Mikey Garcia go the distance with him and, you know, Mikey’s just a little guy and I thought Spence—I thought he would win by knockout but he didn’t even come close in that fight. How great is he? I mean I coached him on the Olympic team back in the day and he’s a very good kid and works hard and so forth, but the thing is in that fight I didn’t see much.”
Just two years ago, with the media calling for his retirement post-Horn loss, it would’ve been hard to imaging Pacquiao reestablishing himself as a high-end presence in the fiercely competitive welterweight class, one win away from being one of the division’s big three. Not many boxing people think that he has much of a chance against Spence and Crawford should he get past Thurman, but, then again, not many people thought he could work his way up to an even-footing bout with Thurman, either.
If there’s anything we’ve come to learn over the course of Manny Pacquiao’s 40 years on this planet and 24 years as a professional prizefighter, it’s that this guy has a knack for pulling off the impossible.
"One thing we have an agreement on is that we’re not here just to make money, just to fight nobodies. We’re here to be the best…”
Four years ago, multi-division world champ Manny Pacquiao had just cashed in on the monster payday against Floyd Mayweather he had been pursuing for years and was claiming a bum shoulder that would not only excuse the loss to his archrival, but also ease him into a dignified retirement.
Things didn’t quite end up with him on a rocking chair, tending to Filipino business as a full-time Senator and ex-boxer, though.
Long-time promoter Bob Arum ran Pacquiao out to the ring three more times post-Mayweather, the third time being the well-expected screw job loss that removed the WBO belt from around his waist and allowed for Arum to eventually transfer some of the Filipino icon’s mojo to Terence Crawford by way of sloppy mauler Jeff Horn.
This would’ve been a second ideal jumping-off point into retirement for Manny. Victimized by the business that had served him so well, there would’ve been a degree of poetic justice in being devoured the way he was by Arum and Horn on Horn’s Australian home turf.
But, no. Pacquiao still felt like he had something left and went about proving it.
A seven-round destruction of Lucas Matthysse as a promotional free agent and a dominant decision win over Adrien Broner in his first fight under the Premier Boxing Champions (PBC) banner proved that he was not done and that, at the very least, he was still a top five or six welterweight.
And now he’s set to meet Keith Thurman on July 20 in a bout that could send him straight into the top three and, at 40 years of age, turn his focus from proving that he belongs to proving that he’s the very best.
“One thing we have an agreement on is that we’re not here just to make money, just to fight nobodies,” trainer Freddie Roach recently told Fight Hub TV. “We’re here to be the best. I mean, that’s why we’re fighting. After this fight we want to fight the best guy out there. I mean we’re kinda hunting for Mayweather a little bit, yes. We’d like that one back one more time, yes. But if it doesn’t come and Errol Spence does, well I mean, that could definitely be our next fight, or [Terence] Crawford or—there’s a lot of guys out there that are very good at 147. So, I mean, there’s some good competition.”
Roach is famous for hyping Manny’s abilities and exploits to ridiculous levels, but he sees flaws in all of the major welterweights ranked ahead of his fighter and feels Manny’s strengths play into those weaknesses.
“You know,” Roach said, “Spence just let Mikey Garcia go the distance with him and, you know, Mikey’s just a little guy and I thought Spence—I thought he would win by knockout but he didn’t even come close in that fight. How great is he? I mean I coached him on the Olympic team back in the day and he’s a very good kid and works hard and so forth, but the thing is in that fight I didn’t see much.”
Just two years ago, with the media calling for his retirement post-Horn loss, it would’ve been hard to imaging Pacquiao reestablishing himself as a high-end presence in the fiercely competitive welterweight class, one win away from being one of the division’s big three. Not many boxing people think that he has much of a chance against Spence and Crawford should he get past Thurman, but, then again, not many people thought he could work his way up to an even-footing bout with Thurman, either.
If there’s anything we’ve come to learn over the course of Manny Pacquiao’s 40 years on this planet and 24 years as a professional prizefighter, it’s that this guy has a knack for pulling off the impossible.
Comment