(Photo credit: Chris Farina/Top Rank) By Chris Williams: WBO welterweight champion Tim Bradley (31-0, 12 KO’s) doesn’t quite understand where Manny Pacquiao (55-5-2, 38 KO’s) is at mentally as they approach their rematch on April 12th. While Pacquiao has said that he wants to fight more aggressively and not be the kind and compassionate fighter who let his recent opponent Brandon Rios off the hook when he could have knocked him out last November, but Bradley still doubts whether Pacquiao still has the fire in him to fight hard.
Pacquiao spoke of wanting to fight will more of a killer instinct recently during their 2-city press tour, but it’s hard to believe Pacquiao will be able to change his basic nature given that he hasn’t shown the fire to really go after his opponents since his win over Miguel Cotto in 2009. After that year, Pacquiao seemed to change completely. He went from a destroyer to a gentle type of fighter who let Joshua Clottey, Antonio Margarito and Shane Mosley all hang around for 12 rounds with him instead of pressing for a knockout. The Pacquiao that beat Oscar De La Hoya and Cotto would have dismantled those three opponents.
“At the face off [last Monday], he couldn’t even say that he wanted to knock me out,” Bradley said to Hustleboss. “That he’s going to knock me out. You know what I mean? It’s like he’s so humbled and he believes in what he believes in…When he gets a guy hurt or stung, he’ll not go after him. Like I said, that’s the compassionate Manny.”
Bradley has a chance of winning another close decision if Pacquiao decides to half-step it, and take it easy on him for fear of hurting him. Bradley has the fighting style to where he can steal a lot of rounds by being able to fight hard in the last 20-30 seconds to impress the judges enough to win the rounds. If Pacquiao is taking it easy on Bradley for most of the rounds then Bradley will have a good chance of getting the better of him being aggressive for when it counts.
Judges are supposed to look at the round as a whole when scoring it, but unfortunately they tend to give rounds almost always to the guy that does the best work in the last 30 seconds. Bradley is very good at coming on in the last seconds of the round to land some clean shots that get the attention of the judges. He’ll probably be looking to do the same thing in the rematch.
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