Pacquiao: My sparring partners were perfect in testing my strategy for Mayweather

By Boxing News - 03/18/2015 - Comments

LR_TRAPPFOTOS-MAYPAC PRESSER-8435(Photo credit: Stephanie Trapp/Mayweather Promotions) By Chris Williams: Manny Pacquiao is pleased with the work his sparking partners gave him on his first day of sparring to help him get ready for his fight against Floyd Mayweather Jr.

Pacquiao has a couple of sparring partners- Rashidi Ellis and Kenneth Sims Jr – that are somewhat similar to Mayweather with the way they fight, although they’re still dramatically different to the point where they’re not going to be able to give Pacquiao a whole lot of help in testing whatever strategy, if any, his trainer Freddie Roach has cooked up for him to get ready for the Mayweather fight on May 2nd at the MGM Grand in Las Vegas, Nevada.

“Manny looked so fresh today. I’m very happy with what he showed me,” Roach said about Pacquiao after his sparring session. You couldn’t tell he had been away from the ring since the [Chris] Algieri fight in November. Manny is on fire in the gym. I am confident May 2 will the day he drove Mayweather out of boxing!”

I hope Roach doesn’t celebrate a little too much ahead of time with his vision thing about Pacquiao winning, because things could go terribly wrong for the 36-year-old Pacquiao when he gets inside the ring with the real thing on May 2nd rather than a sparring partner that is mimicking his fighting style.

Roach needs to keep his feet on the ground and realize that his fighter arguably was beaten four times by Juan Manuel Marquez in the past, and this is a guy that Mayweather easily beat by a lopsided 12 round unanimous decision in 2009.

Based on how Pacquiao looked in his four fights against Marquez, Roach shouldn’t even be considering that Pacquiao will be able to beat Mayweather in this fight. It just doesn’t work out that way when you compare how the two fighters did against a common opponent in Marquez. Mayweather totally dominated Marquez, and Pacquiao should have lost all four fights with the Mexican warrior in my view.

“My sparring partners gave me good work today. They were perfect for testing the strategy Freddie and I have developed to beat Floyd Mayweather. I was very happy with my stamina and speed today,” Pacquiao said.

I wonder what fight strategy that Pacquiao is talking about. I can only guess that it’s the same strategy that he’s been using in all of his fights since he turned pro in 1995, because he still fights the exact same way. It’s as if Roach hasn’t done anything at all to change Pacquiao’s fighting style.

Sure, Roach works Pacquiao into shape by having him work hard in Roach’s Wildcard Gym in Los Angeles, California, but I don’t see any change at all in Pacquiao’s fighting style. So when you hear Pacquiao saying “they were perfect for testing the strategy Freddie and I have developed to beat Floyd Mayweather,” I either think Pacquiao is totally deluded or trying to throw Mayweather off by making him think he’s got an actual strategy.

I do think Pacquiao has a fight strategy for the Mayweather fight, but I don’t see it being any different from the fight strategies that Pacquiao has always used in the past. In other words, Pacquiao is very likely to try and jump in and jump out the way he always does.

Yeah, you can expect Pacquiao to try and use his side to side movement, or at least try to. He’s not really able to fight like this anymore due to his advanced age. When he moves side to side now, he looks slow and the only thing he accomplishes with that movement is tiring himself out.

The same goes for the hopping around that Pacquiao likes to do when on the outside. He’s constantly jumping up and down on his feet, and it doesn’t seem to have any real purpose as far as I can tell.

YouTube video

When you watch this useless hopping by Pacquiao, it’s not surprising that he has cramp problems, because when hop like that for three minutes of every round, it’s quite possible that it would lead to a cramp developing in your calves or thighs from all the hoping.

I’m surprised that Roach never got Pacquiao to stop this useless tactic because it really serves no purpose at all. It’s like a fighter moving to the outside and throwing air punches for no reason without purpose. It doesn’t make sense.

If anything, Pacquiao should be using this training camp to rid himself of all the bad habits he has in his game, because I think he’d be 100 percent better fighter without the hopping and side to side movement he makes, because those are major energy wasters for the soon to be 37-year-old Pacquiao.

Even if he was a young fighter, he’d still be wasting energy with the hoping and side to side movement. But with Pacquiao nearing 40, he really need to be smarter about the energy he uses in his fights so that he doesn’t cramp up or run out of gas after the 6th round.

A loss for Pacquiao in this fight is going to be a real negative for his career. Unless Mayweather gives Pacquiao an immediate rematch, I can see Pacquiao’s pay-per-view buys going downward in the future. There would be nothing for boxing fans to look forward to for Pacquiao like there’s been in the past with fans looking forward to a Mayweather-Pacquiao fight. Once Pacquiao gets exposed, he’ll be seen as the No.2 guy, and when you’re No.2, it’s not good.



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