Pacquaio Interested In Hatton Bout

By Boxing News - 06/10/2008 - Comments

pacquiao544.jpgBy Scott Gilfoid: In the ultimate in overreach on his part, WBC super featherweight champion Manny Pacquiao (46-3-2, 35 KOs) is reportedly interested in a bout with light welterweight former champion Ricky Hatton (43-1, 31 KOs) in the near future. First, however, Pacquiao has to deal with WBC lightweight champion David Diaz, with whom Pacquiao is scheduled to fight later this month on June 28th, at the Mandalay Bay Resort & Casino, in Las Vegas, Nevada. That in itself will be a rather difficult task for the 29 year-old Pacquiao in that he’s moving up five pounds in weight to fight Diaz at the 135 pound lightweight class.

If, however, Pacquiao can get by Diaz, then there’s a chance for to arrange a fight with Hatton, if he’s interested. According to reports, Ricky’s father has said that they’re interested in the idea, though a lot of this also hinges on whether Ricky is successful in his upcoming bout with IBF light welterweight champion Paulie Malignaggi later on this year. Pacquiao is said to be willing to fight wherever Hatton wants, even if it means having to travel all the way to England and fight in front of Hatton’s often loud Manchester crowd. Pacquiao, it seems, is willing to take the risk in order to get the biggest payday of his career by far.

As for the weight differences between him and Hatton, Pacquiao is said to walk around between fights at around 150 lbs, making it an easy task for him to fight at the 140 lb. light welterweight division. Pacquiao also states that he regularly spars with 150 lb fighters, and has an understanding of how hard they can hit. From the sounds of it, Pacquiao appears to be very confident about his chances against Hatton and is willing to move up in weight to take the risk. Pacquiao is considered by many boxing fans and writers alike to be the best pound-for-pound fighter in all of boxing and has been for quite some time.

Both Hatton and Pacquiao are far from a lock at winning their next fights, both having come off less than impressive performances in their most recent fights. In Pacquiao’s case, he appeared to have been given a gift split decision victory over Juan Manuel Marquez on March 15th at the Mandalay Bay Resort & Casino, in Las Vegas. Few Americans, however, feel that Pacquiao won the fight as he had problems for most of the bout with the clever boxing skills of Marquez.

Recently, Ricky Hatton turned down an opportunity to fight Oscar De La Hoya in September, a date which was made available at the sudden retirement of Floyd Mayweather Jr., De La Hoya’s original scheduled opponent for that month. However, Hatton has a bout of his own coming up in November against IBF light welterweight champion Paulie Malignaggi and Hatton didn’t want to lose out on that fight. Besides that, Hatton is still holding out on the slim chance that Mayweather might have a change of mind and come out of retirement and fight Hatton.

It seems that Hatton deeply wants an opportunity to avenge his prior defeat to Mayweather, an utterly humiliating one-sided 10th round TKO in December. Mayweather had mentioned wanting to fight Hatton as well in recent months, but Floyd had also been concerned about Hatton building his name back up by looking good in wins against other opponents, so as to make their perspective bout less of a farce than what most people think of it now.

Hatton, however, looked mediocre in his last fight against Mexican Juan Lazcano and appeared to need help in the 10th round when he was hurt by a big left hand from Lazcano. A fight against Pacquiao, a very popular fighter throughout the world, might just be the bargaining chip that Hatton needs to get Mayweather out of retirement and back in the ring against Hatton. If not that, I don’t know what else would. Neither Pacquiao or Hatton are the same fighters they were three years ago, and it’s debatable which one has the most left.

I doubt that the weight would be much of an issue for Pacquiao because he’s so much faster than Hatton and probably equally as powerful, if not more. Considering that Pacquiao fought almost equal to Marquez in their last fight, I’d have to pick Pacquiao to beat Hatton in a fight that would probably be a lot easier than most people would imagine. Marquez is light years better than Hatton in overall skill, and if Pacquiao can stay neck and neck with a fighter of Marquez’s stature, he’ll have no problems beating the likes of Hatton.



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