By Dave Lahr: WBO welterweight champion Manny Pacquiao still stubbornly thinks he actually beat Juan Manuel Marquez in their third fight on November 12th, despite an overwhelming amount of boxing fans seeing Marquez as the winner of that fight. It’s kind of sad really to see Pacquiao, his trainer Freddie Roach and his legion of fans still seeing him as the winner. Pacquiao lost alright and he’s going to have to live with it. My suggestion is he embrace the defeat rather than fighting reality.

Pacquiao told philboxing.com “I believe that even before the 12 round bout was over, I was ahead and had won…I did my best under the circumstances to defend my crown and I succeeded, a factor which cannot be said of my opponent, who did nothing in the entire 12 rounds but run away, wait for me to attack and counter punch. You cannot win a championship that way. If you become champion, you have to fight for it, earn it and win it.”

Pacquiao sounds more than a little bitter, doesn’t he? It’s like he’s lashing out at the fans for seeing what was obvious to all – Marquez being the winner. Instead of scolding the fans, Pacquiao should be seeing it through their eyes. Fans like Pacquiao and obvious wanted him to win, but they’re going to honest about who they saw win the fight. They’re not just going to side with Pacquiao because they like him a lot like some fans do.

I personally have watched the Pacquiao-Marquez III fight seven times now and my scores for each time I saw it was 116-112 for Marquez. I played it back without the sound off a couple of times, and watched in slow motions. And I still saw Marquez landing the cleaner shots and making Pacquiao look like an unskilled amateur. Marquez was just so much better in terms of technical skills compared to Pacquiao. Marquez made Pacquiao look like he was still learning the game, like he hadn’t learned a thing from his trainer Freddie Roach.