Is Moorer a Better Trainer Than Roach?
April 16th, 2009
By Scott Gilfoid: I’ve seen Manny Pacquiao’s trainer give advice to his different fighters over the years and I’ve often wondered about the logic of some of the things he’s said, but in watching him train side by side with his assistant trainer Michael Moorer on the Pacquiao-Hatton 24/7 special, I now see Moorer as by far the better trainer and the one giving more sound advice to Pacquiao.
During the three years that Moorer held the World Boxing Organization light heavyweight title, he defended the belt successfully nine times, knocking out every one of his opponents. In fact, Moorer’s record as a light heavyweight was perfect, with 22 knockouts in 22 fights. At light heavyweight, Moorer was essentially unbeatable.
The reason why he moved away from the division was to seek out bigger paydays at heavyweight. The fact that he was able to succeed at heavyweight, too, winning both the WBA and IBF heavyweight crowns shows you how great of a fighter he was. It’s one thing to move up from cruiserweight to win a heavyweight title like Evander Holyfield did, but quite a different kettle of fish to move up from 175 to 235 to campaign against big heavyweights like George Foreman.
Now, I’ve watched the Pacquiao-Hatton 24/7 episode #1 on HBO, and listened to the coaching that both Roach and Moorer were giving to Pacquiao, and I got to say that for me Moorer is the much better trainer. Heck, I can’t understand what Roach is saying half the time because he’s slurring his words, and the things that he does say are really basic.
Moorer, though, has pinpoint advice to give to Pacquiao, telling to watch his head when he throws hooks because his head is following the hook. I’m not sure how well Pacquiao was able to grasp the advice because he seemed to stare right through Moorer as if he was a space alien or something.
Immediately after that, Pacquiao preceded to make the same mistake by having his head follow his left hook. It seemed like Moorer needed to take over the training session at that point and get Pacquiao’s attention somehow.
Not sure what Moorer needs to do to achieve that, because Pacquiao seems to be on auto pilot most of the time, just attacking without much real strategy going on. Maybe a rolled up newspaper might do the trick to get Pacquiao to listen at time.
When he’s not paying attention, Moorer should whack him one to get him to listen up. It also would help if Moorer would have Pacquiao repeat what he Michael just said to him to ensure that it’s getting through to Pacquiao’s gray matter somehow.
As far as I can tell, Roach is just walking around with the green body pad and letting Pacquiao tee off on him. This isn’t training. Pads don’t hit back and they don’t mimic real life boxing fights. If Roach wants to help Pacquiao, Roach will take his silly green body pad and throw out in the alley and get Pacquiao in some sparring sessions with talented sparring partners.
Let Moorer put on the gloves and mimic Ricky Hatton for 10 rounds. Of course, Moorer would have to be very careful with Pacquiao because with the power that Moorer has in his left hook, he’d likely take Pacquiao’s head off with every left hook he throws. The power of Moorer would get Pacquiao accustomed to what he’s going to be facing against Hatton on May 2nd.
Tags: 7 Responses to “Is Moorer a Better Trainer Than Roach?”
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I’ve often been tempted to but never quite felt the need to post on here before but enough’s enough! Gilfoid, you chat sh*t every time you write and to be perfectly honest you don’t even write awfully well. PLEASE stop writing! It would do you a lot of good!
First thing the 24/7 series is awsome we know that but it dosent show everything and im sure roach does a lot more than just give pacman advice on 24 7. Also the reason why moorer is more louder is because roach is busy with doing the pads and will find are to talk while the best fighter on the planet hits you
Have a word. Look at the fighters he’s had, he must be doing something right!! Just coz he wasn’t a great fighter, don’t mean he aint a great trainer, the 2 don’t have to go in hand. Infact, you usually find in any sport, boxing included, that the best trainers/coaches never excelled in the sport, their talent lays in coaching, likewise top performers don’t necessarily make good trainers.
As for sparing-you do that at the end, after you’ve done ya bag and pad work, worked on ya hand/foot work etc-it’s like a jigsaw, ya gotta put it all together, and get the timing of it all right-but you know that coz you done karate!!
how on earth can you make that judgment now,youv seen one clip of 24/7,a few words said and you jump to conclusions,whats moore done ????
If Moorer is a great trainer it is only from learning from his own mistakes, Freddie Roach said once how hard it was to get him to warm up before a fight and how he would often neglect his training, he was talented but very lazy
I cant beleive that most writers on this sight know more than these trainers that have been doing this job for years.
How can you say that freddie roach doesnt know what he is doing you talk some C**p on here sometimes you need to read what you are writing.
All of sudden Freddie Roach forgot how to train, or has his being named 2007,2008 trainer of the year a mistake, how easy you dismiss the accomplishments, whether he is, or forgot everything, or you have a new favourite trainer, Moorer was a great fighter but training a fighter that was made before he showed up appears to look and sound like he knows boxing, where was he when Freddie was making Manny the best fighter, by everybody standards.