By Chris Williams: Promoter Bob Arum of Top Rank says that Manny Pacquiao (54-5-2, 38 KO’s) told him that Juan Manuel Marquez (55-6-1, 40 KO’s) was neither stronger nor a bigger puncher in their fight last Saturday night compared to how he punched in their three previous fights.
That’s kind of unusual thing to say given that Marquez knocked Pacquiao down twice in the fight and he’d never knocked Pacquiao down in their other fights. You have to wonder whether Pacquiao was thinking clearly after his 6th round knockout loss to Marquez, because the logical conclusion one would make after watching that fight is that Marquez IS punching harder than before.
It’s either that or Pacquiao’s punch resistance has deteriorated. Either way, it’s not a good deal for Pacquiao because he wants to fight Marquez a 5th time, saying Arum.
Speaking with Greg Leon at Boxingtalk.com, Arum said “He [Pacquiao] says that Marquez didn’t appear to be stronger to him, neither was his punching power any different than he recalls it was in the other three fights.”
So is Pacquiao just not willing to give Marquez the credit that’s due to him or is his memory of their three previous fights not as accurate as it should be? I think it’s painfully obvious that Marquez is punching harder than he was before. It would make sense because he’s put on a lot of muscle, and you can see that from his third fight last November compared to how he’s looking now. Marquez is quite a bit more muscular but not heavier. He’s taken off the fat that he had on him, which wasn’t much, and replaced it with muscle.
That muscle definitely had him throwing with more power because it was useful muscle that his strength trainer Angel Hernandez had helped develop with explosion type exercises that simulate punching. It wasn’t a case of Marquez just lifting weights and then becoming muscle-bound with muscles that couldn’t help him in a fight. Hernandez worked on strength resistance exercises that made Marquez a much bigger puncher than before.
This is Pacquiao should have been doing with his strength and conditioning coach Alex Ariza because he had the perfect coach to do the same thing that Hernandez did with Marquez but Pacquiao failed to utilize Ariza.
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