By Allan Fox: Boxing great “Sugar” Ray Leonard has a lot of respect for both Floyd Mayweather Jr. and Manny Pacquiao as fighters. However, he thinks they both would have been in deep, deep water had they been around to face him in his prime as well as Tommy “Hitman” Hearns. Leonard thinks he and Hearns would KO both Mayweather and Pacquiao.
Speaking with RingTV, Leonard said “I don’t think he [Pacquiao] has ever fought anybody who is 6-foot-2. I don’t think he’s ever faced someone with that kind of height and that power with that type of speed…I think Tommy knocks both of those guys [Mayweather and Pacquiao] out.”
Leonard went on to say that he too would knockout both Mayweather and Pacquiao if he were in his prime still. He sees things in their fighting style that he feels would enable him to score a knockout. I’m not sure what it is but you can’t doubt the man because when Leonard was in his prime, he was next to unbeatable when he was fighting smart and not just looking to brawl.
Hearns would be a very tough opponent for both Mayweather and Pacquiao, especially with Pacquiao because he’s so easy to hit. Hearns had one punch knockout power at welterweight, and if he was facing an opponent with flawed defensive skills like Pacquiao, he would knock them out when he was at welterweight. Hearns had problems later on in his career when he moved up to middleweight and light heavyweight. His power was so good that he was still a huge puncher even in the higher weight classes. But at welterweight, Hearns was a monster and if put in with a fighter that was easy to hit like Pacquiao, Hearns would likely have destroyed him in the same way that he did against Roberto Duran.
Comments are closed.