By Chris Williams: Well, it looks like even Manny Pacquiao realizes that his old strength has abandoned him suddenly now that he’s gone three entire years without one knockout win. His latest performance, a loss to Tim Bradley, showed clearly that Pacquiao’s strength – and conditioning – just isn’t there anymore.

Alex Ariza, Pacquiao’s strength and conditioning coach, told the Manila Standard that Pacquiao personally told him “We need to work on my power and strength again.”

Again? When did Ariza stop working on Pacquiao’s power? Was it in 2009? Because that was the last time Pacquiao scored a knockout when he just barely got a 12th round stoppage win over Miguel Cotto. How come Ariza stopped working on Pacquiao’s strength? If he did stop, then why in the heck did Pacquiao keep Ariza hanging around? If the strength hasn’t been there in years, then why keep the guy? If it was me, I would cleaned house a long time ago and swept Aria and trainer Freddie Roach out the door, along with the entire entourage. It would be all new blood, starting with a new trainer, and then a different strength coach. Someones got to take the blame for three years of poor performances from Pacquiao, right?

Ariza said that Pacquiao told him that the two of them will sit down and watch tape of Pacquiao’s loss to Bradley. I’m not sure what Pacquiao can get from that experience other than learning what he should already know – that his power and stamina have taken a major hike.

Here’s my thoughts: When you get a guy that is no longer knocking guys out, and who is having serious stamina issues, those problems generally don’t improve with age. There’s a point of no return for a fighter regardless of what sport they’re competing. If you have a home run hitter in baseball with declining home-run stats, they generally don’t all of a sudden get better just because he sat down with his strength coach to work on building more power. They tend to get worse.

I know Barry Bonds is an exception to that rule, but for the most part, an old guy that isn’t getting the job done like he used to tends to continue on the path as he gets older. It doesn’t get better unfortunately. So, Pacquiao can work hard with Ariza on his strength, but I don’t see it helping him. If anything, it’ll hurt Pacquiao because he’ll become even more slow and sluggish.

What he should be doing is working on getting as light as he can so that his feet are quicker, and he doesn’t get tired out. Speed was what made Pacquiao good in the past, not his power. The thing is I don’t think Pacquiao can go back to what he was even if he does lean down by getting rid of all that useless bulk that he’s put on in recent years.