Manny Pacquiao won in my eyes- but he is showing clear signs of decline!

By Boxing News - 06/10/2012 - Comments

Image: Manny Pacquiao won in my eyes- but he is showing clear signs of decline!By Colm Hutchinson: I just posted an article of my thoughts on what was a blatantly bad judging decision. Having watched the fight again, this time with the sound off, I once again had Manny Pacquiao as the clear victor, this time 115-113, again trying to give Tim Bradley rounds wherever possible. This was to see if I could come somewhere close to the 2 ringside judges scores.

I still couldn’t possibly find 7 rounds for Bradley. I based my scoring on; punches landed, effective punches (i.e. damaging punches), power shots, effective aggression and ring generalship, giving a score out of 5 for each. Then I tallied up these scores to decide the winner of each round. I still had Pacquiao the clear winner.

We can’t change the decision, that’s boxing unfortunately, but I would like to speak about the Pacquiao performance. All in all, it was disappointing to be honest. Yes, he won the fight on my card and was superior to Bradley in almost every department, but it was completely his fault that the judges could even consider it possible to give the close rounds to Bradley.
Gone it seems is the dazzling in and out, side to side monster that was Pacquiao, pressuring his opponents from the first bell to the last. Instead, Manny seemed to take the first 2 minutes of each round off, smiling at Bradley and constantly smacking his gloves together hoping Bradley would engage. When he decided to go to work he was winning every exchange and staggered Bradley a number of times. Yet, he just didn’t do this often enough and was happy to bounce around for the first 2 minutes before finally trying to unload some shots in the last minute of each round.

From rounds 8 onwards he seemed happy that he was winning the fight comfortably (which he was), and tried to coast through the rest of the fight, which allowed Bradley to win a few of the final rounds (I gave him the 10th and 12th), and could possibly see how the 11th was given to him as well.

To me, it seems Manny is suffering from a number of things this late in his career. Firstly, it’s clear he has lost his killer instinct. He could have really closed the show after the 4th round when Bradley was in trouble. If he had have really piled on the aggression from the 5th-7th round, I have little doubt he could have ended the fight with a KO. Instead, he just didn’t show the venom and determination to go after a clearly shaken fighter and take him out. This is not the Manny that destroyed Diaz, Morales or Barrera. It’s not the Manny that wouldn’t let up on DLH in the 8th round.

Secondly, has the wear and tear just reduced his stamina completely? I think this is why he took the first 2 minutes off in each round. From the 8th round, I noticed he was breathing through his mouth which is something we are not accustomed to seeing with Manny P. This is the whirlwind that could throw 70-100 punches a round for 12 rounds. His output tonight wasn’t near that and he suffered as a result.

These two big factors allowed the decision to be taken from him, when it was in his power to leave no doubt as to whom the better fighter is. I think the vast majority of spectators agree, Manny clearly won the fight and was robbed by a bad decision, but I worry that he has reached the end of the line. His legacy has been built on non-stop aggression and all out attack. I only saw that tonight in very small bursts and I feel his best days are definitely behind him.



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