Perennial contender Juan Manuel Márquez of Mexico shocked the world on Saturday when he knocked out Manny Pacquiao of the Philippines in the sixth round at the MGM Grand in Las Vegas. And nowhere was this shock felt more profoundly than in Pacquiao’s home country where he’s a bona fide national hero.
Pacquiao, of course, is the eight-division world champion and reputed “best pound-for-pound boxer’ of all time who inspired this exceptional praise from no less a person than Bob Arum:
I will go on record, and I really believe, that Manny Pacquiao is the best fighter that I’ve ever seen. And that includes Ali and Sugar Ray Leonard, and Marvin Hagler. I have never ever seen anything like him…
Ray Leonard is a great friend of mine and he was a great fighter, but he doesn’t compare to Manny Pacquiao, in my opinion. Ray had great, great skills, great heart, and he was a tremendous fighter, but he didn’t have the same type of extraordinary skills that Pacquiao has.
(Boxing Scene, November 24, 2009)
Arum, of course, is the E.F. Hutton of Boxing – as revered in this sport as David Stern is in Basketball. Which is why most sports writers took as gospel his dubious assessment of Pacquiao’s skills.
When Top Rank chairman Bob Arum said last November that he considered Manny Pacquiao the best fighter he’d ever seen, it seemed at the time as little more than promoter hyperbole…
After watching Pacquiao decimate opponent after opponent over the last two-plus years, perhaps Arum isn’t as batty as we all thought.
(Kevin Iole, Boxing analyst for Yahoo Sports, November 14, 2010)
I, however, thought his assessment amounted to nothing more than self-serving, heretical bullshit. And I wrote as much:
I too have seen all of the great champions who Arum dismisses as mere contenders. And I have yet to see any fighter display the combination of power, speed, and style (or poetry in motion) that Muhammad Ali did in his prime…
But I would go further, on the record, in declaring that even Sugar Ray Leonard, himself a junior middleweight champion, should rank above Pacquiao in the pantheon of great fighters. For no fighter in the lighter weight classes has emulated Ali’s remarkable combination of power, speed, and style than Sugar Ray.
More to the point, just as Ali proved his mettle against the best fighters of his day, including bull dogs like Smokin’ Joe Frazier and giants like George Forman, Sugar Ray did the same against Tommy “Hitman” Hearns and Marvin Hagler.
Meanwhile, Pacquiao’s stellar record is distinguished only by beating up former Golden Boy Oscar de la Hoya long after his prime – when he was clearly more interested in parading around in drag (complete with wig, panties, fishnet stockings and pumps) than in suiting up for the gladiatorial sport of boxing…
But nothing demonstrates how unworthy Pacquiao is of Arum’s praise quite like the fact that he has done everything possible to avoid getting into the ring with the man generally regarded as “the best pound-for-pound fighter” in the world today, Floyd Mayweather Jr…
Finally, if none of my arguments convince you that Arum’s contention is bullshit, just bear in mind that he’s Pacquiao’s fight promoter. And, as any promoter knows, hype – no matter how absurd – sells.
(“Pacquiao – the Best Fighter Ever?!” The iPINIONS Journal, November 18, 2010)
This is why I was not at all surprised when Pacquiao looked more like the journeyman fighter everyone thought Márquez was fated to be. In their three previous fights, Pacquiao won two split decisions and the other ended in a draw. That Márquez knocked him out in this one vindicates my suspicion that the outcome of their previous fights had more to do with judges buying into Arum’s promotional hype than Pacquiao’s performance in the ring.
This humiliating loss was the second-consecutive one for Pacquiao. More importantly, though, it demonstrated why Pacquiao has ducked every opportunity to fight the undefeated (43-0) Mayweather – who, incidentally, dominated Márquez in their one fight in 2009.
Apropos of which, you can be forgiven for having no clue that there was (and perhaps still is) as great a demand in the Boxing world for a Pacquiao vs. Mayweather fight as there has been for any fight in history. But there can be no doubt now that Mayweather would put an even bigger ass whoopin’ on Pacquiao than Márquez did on Saturday night.
If I were Mayweather, though, I would not even dignify Pacquiao by stepping into the ring with him at this point. In fact, Pacquiao might want to have a heart-to-heart chat with Roberto Duran for insight on the ignominious fate that awaits him if he does not retire, immediately.
Meanwhile, does anybody know who the world heavyweight champion is these days? Does anybody care…?
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Pacquiao – the best…?