Ariza thinks Pacquiao can stop Bradley in less than five rounds if he trains correctly

By Boxing News - 04/09/2012 - Comments

Image: Ariza thinks Pacquiao can stop Bradley in less than five rounds if he trains correctlyBy Chris Williams: WBO welterweight champion Manny Pacquiao’s strength and conditioning trainer Alex Ariza sees his fighter destroying unbeaten Timothy Bradley within five rounds if Pacquiao follows his training regimen to the letter during his training camp for Pacquiao’s June 9th fight against Bradley in Las Vegas.

Ariza said to Philstar.com “How he [Pacquiao] trains will impact on how he does against Bradley. If he trains properly, Manny could blow that guy [Bradley] in less than five rounds.”

That’s pretty amazing given that Ariza also thought Pacquiao would blow out Juan Manuel Marquez. I wonder if the bad results of that fight was because he didn’t follow Ariza’s training regimen to the letter.

I think it’s beyond training for Pacquiao. You can take an aging fighter like Pacquiao and put them through some kind of military boot camp with 8 weeks of grueling exercises and the most perfect diet, and you’re still likely going to get a fighter that does well in the early rounds and then start to fade when the legs go in the 2nd half of the fight. He’ll likely get just as tired as he would if he had gone through an easier came. In my experience, when you get an aging fighter, you need to back off with the exercises by slowing things down. You can’t overdo it with a fighter that is starting to show age because you get diminishing returns. It’s like someone exercising two hours a day and then figuring they’ll look three times as good if they work out six hours a day. What you get a drained looking person who looks like a long distance runner with little body fat.

I don’t see Pacquiao stopping Bradley no matter what he does in training. No way is he going to stop him within five rounds. The best he can hope for is if Bradley gets cut and you get a doctor’s stoppage. But in a fight where cuts are an issue, I’d be more inclined to seeing Pacquiao as the one that gets stopped rather than Bradley because Pacquiao has the scar tissue around his eyes and Bradley likes to lead with his head. Pacquiao has the better chance of being cut than Bradley.



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