Ellerbe: Pacquiao will be shell-shocked when the bell rings against Mayweather

By Boxing News - 04/18/2015 - Comments

Floyd Mayweather Work Out for the PressBy Chris Williams: It’s quite common for fighters to appear overawed by the experience of getting in the ring with superstar Floyd Mayweather Jr. for the first time, and this causes them to fight below their potential.

Mayweather Promotions CEO Leonard Ellerbe feels that Manny Pacquiao will be a little overwhelmed by the impact of sharing the same ring with the world famous Mayweather in their fight on May 2nd next month, and he feels that Pacquioao us going to underperform instead of over perform.

The thing is Pacquiao is probably going to need to put in a performance that is way over his normal playing level for him to pull off an upset of Maytweather. Pacquiao can’t afford to have a letdown against Mayweather and still hope to beat him.

“Manny will tell you guys one thing but when the bell rings he’s going to be a little shell shocked,” Ellerbe said via RingTV.com. “He thinks he’s going to be able to come out and do his thing like he wants to but he’s in for a rude awakening on May 2.”

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Ellerbe sees Mayweather dictating the action and putting Pacquiao in his place. A lot of boxers that face Mayweather are used to having their own way, but they soon find out that it’s Mayweather who is dictating what goes on in the ring rather than themselves. Instead of being the one in control the fighters find that they are the ones that are being controlled by Mayweather. At that point defeat is inevitable for the fighters. They can’t compete with Mayweather, and they wind up losing by a lopsided decision or a knockout.

“Floyd Mayweather is going to try to take Manny Pacquiao’s head off and you can count on that happening,” Ellerbe said. “He’s looking to finish him off and I strongly believe that will happen.”

Finishing Pacquiao off could be bad for the Filipino star because you never know how he might respond to being knocked out again. The last time Pacquiao was knocked out in 2012, it was brutal to watch with him getting put down on his face by a right hand from Juan Manuel Marquez. Pacquiao didn’t stir for over a minute, and his assistant helper Buboy Fernandez got really worked up about it, especially when one of the photographers at ringside attempted to take a harmless photo of the knockout.

There’s no question that Mayweather is going to be looking to knock Pacquiao out in this fight. Mayweather has worked tirelessly for weeks with his strength and conditioning coach Alex Ariza in developing his punching power, and the hard work appears to have paid off with Mayweather punching harder now.

With his added power, Mayweather could be really dangerous for Pacquiao because the Filipino star hasn’t faced a puncher since his loss to Marquez three years ago. Since that brutal defeat, Pacquiao has been taking it easy in facing the slow as molasses Brandon Rios, and the light hitting Chris Algieri and Tim Bradley. Mayweather is going to be looking to reintroduce Pacquiao to getting hit with power shots because it’s been a while since Pacquiao has been nailed with big shots in the last three years.



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