By Chris Williams: WBO welterweight champion Manny Pacquiao is being secretive about the sparring partners his trainer Freddie Roach has dug up for him to spar with at the Wildcard Gym in Los Angeles, California.
Roach found two new sparring partners that he believes will help Pacquiao get ready for his mega-cash fight against Floyd Mayweather Jr on May 2nd at the MGM Grand in Las Vegas, Nevada.
There’s been rumors that Mayweather’s adviser Al Haymon has been hiring away some of the potential sparring partners for Pacquiao by offering them better money. By Pacquiao being secretive about the names of his sparring partners, he’s potentially keeping them from being hired by Haymon.
Even if Haymon was taking some of Pacquiao’s sparring partners before they officially started sparring with him, it’s no big deal. It’s a free market, and the highest bidder gets the top sparring partners. You can’t blame anyone for wanting to pay to get the best staff for their fighters.
“My sparring sessions will start next week. Coach Freddie had already hired two tough guys who can help me in my preparation,” Pacquiao said via Philboxing.com. “I don’t have their names. But even if I knew them, I will not reveal their identity. They might be offered money again,” Pacquiao said.
It really doesn’t matter if Pacquiao is going to be secretive about his sparring partners. There are so many people standing outside the Wildcard gym seeing who comes and goes.
It’s going to be impossible for Pacquiao and Roach to hide the identity of the sparring partners unless they have them come and go in disguise. Even that wouldn’t work because the sparring partners will likely start blabbing to everyone in a short time that they’re sparring with Pacquiao, so the secret will be out.
Mayweather already has a couple of excellent sparring partners signed on in DeMarcus Corley and Zab Judah. Those guys are both southpaws with excellent punching power. What makes Corley and Judah so good is that they’re extremely athletic and able to mimic any fighter in the game no matter who it is.
If you asked them to mimic Wladimir Klitschko, I’m sure they could and do a very good job of it. That’s what makes those guys so good. They’re mature, intelligent and able to copy any fighter you want them to.
For Pacquiao’s sake, you got to hope that Roach is having him work on a good fight strategy with all the sparring partners that he brings in. You don’t want to see Roach sending sparring partners out there and then having Pacquiao jump all over them in trying to KO them immediately.
Pacquiao needs to be working on a game plan that he can use for the Mayweather fight. Pacquiao isn’t training for a fight against one of Bob Arum’s Top Rank stable fighters that he can totally dominate in the ring.
This time Pacquiao is going to be in with a talented fighter capable of boxing circles around him for 12 rounds. If Pacquiao trains to obliterate weak opposition then he’s going to be out of his class when he gets in there with Mayweather.
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