By Jason Kim: Since Antonio Margarito has been looking like a shell of his former self in the past two fights, he has to get back to the basics and go back to the teaching of his old trainer Javier Capetillo if he wants to beat Manny Pacquiao on November 13th at the Cowboys Stadium, in Arlington, Texas. It’s too bad Bob Arum waited until Margarito was struggling and looking almost shot before putting Margarito in with Pacquiao. However, maybe Margarito can go back to his old form if he trains hard enough, throws a lot of punches and fights aggressively against Pacquiao.

In his loss to Shane Mosley last year, Margarito simply looked too slow and didn’t have any ideas how to deal with Mosley’s in and out attacks and strategic clinching. But now that a year has passed, Margarito should have trained enough to deal with that kind of style of fighting because that’s how Pacquiao is going to be fighting him. Pacquiao isn’t just going to stand in front of Margarito for 12 rounds like Manny did in his win over Joshua Clottey in March.

In his last fight against Roberto Garcia in May, Margarito defeated Garcia by a 10 round decision to capture the little known WBC International Light Middleweight title. Margarito boxed Garcia and looked like a completely different fighter from what he used to be. Instead of throwing a lot of punches, Margarito boxed Garcia for most of the fight and settled for a dull 10 round decision.

It wasn’t thrilling stuff and it was hard to imagine that Margarito could be a quality fighter using that new style. One can hope that Margarito isn’t foolish enough to think he can out-box Pacquiao in November using that style of fighting because Margarito doesn’t seem suited for it. He may be able to beat a guy like Garcia by boxing him, but it won’t work against Pacquiao. For him to have chance of beating Pacquiao, Margarito has to use Capetillo’s style of throwing a lot of punches, putting a lot of pressure on Pacquiao and hope that he can wear the smaller Pacquiao down over 12 rounds.

Clottey seemed to be getting to Pacquiao with his superior size in his March fight, but Clottey failed to throw enough punches to win the fight. Margarito has to go back to his 2008 style of fighting if he wants to beat Pacquiao and I’m not sure he can. Margarito looks bigger with his upper body than he was back in 2008, and all that extra muscle seems to have slowed Margarito down in terms of being able to throw a lot of shots.

Margarito has to go back to his brawling style of fighting because that’s what got him to this point and the only style that he seems to be good at. It may not work in beating Pacquiao, but it’s only chance. He’s not going to be able to out-box Pacquiao, that’s for sure.