By Chris Williams: Trainer Freddie Roach is starting to show signs of worry about his fighter Manny Pacquiao’s recent training sessions. Roach is shutting down the interviews for the 36-year-old Pacquiao until the April 15th media day. What happened was that Roach wanted a couple of sparring partners that mimicked the fighting style of Floyd Mayweather Jr. in order to get Pacquiao ready for the May 2nd fight.
The problem is that they found some guys that are too much like Mayweather, and Pacquiao is reportedly starting to struggle with some of his sparring partners. Boxing news like this is obviously bad for Pacquiao, because he needs to be able to shine against the Mayweather type fighters.
The fact that he’s not is really telling, because when he faces the real thing on May 2nd, we could see Pacquiao get straight up clowned by Mayweather. If it ends up being a one-sided fight, then that means no rematch for Pacquiao. The boxing public won’t go for the idea of a rematch if Mayweather totally dominates Pacquiao.
The word is Pacquiao is having problems cutting off the ring on his speedy, Mayweather-like sparring partners like he did against Chris Algieri last November. Roach isn’t happy. It’s unclear what Roach was expecting from Pacquiao.
“Freddie Roach is not entirely satisfied with how Pacquiao has looked in sparring, specifically in how Pacquiao is not cutting off the ring as sharply as he did in November,” Lance Pugmire said via the latimes.com.
Algieri was never a guy that was considered fast on his feet, so it’s not surprising that Pacquiao was able to cut off the ring on him to land his shots. But in Roach getting a couple of fast fighters in Rashidi Ellis and Kenneth Sims Jr, it’s really not surprising that Pacquiao is having problems trying to cut off the ring against them if those are the ones that Pacquiao is struggling against. Those fighters would likely give Pacquiao all he could handle in an actual fight.
“We’ve done so much press. He’s a little tired of it,” Roach said via the latimes.com. “I can be tired. He can’t.”
When hear a fighter’s trainer grasping for reasons to explain why his fighter is struggling in sparring sessions, it tells you that there’s some panic going on. I think Roach is definitely starting to worry about his fighter.
Even Pacquiao is starting to reach with the excuses.
“I’m not complaining about interviews,” Pacquiao said to the latimes.com. “This is just the first time I’m asking for time to focus. There’s something I need to achieve in this camp, especially mentally.”
Does this sound like a fighter who is starting to worry? It does to me. I think Pacquiao is worried now because he’s not dominating his sparring partners like he used to. They got some guys that are obviously a lot better than the fighters that they usually have as sparring partners, and Pacquiao is starting to struggle.
The guys that Pacquiao has fought for the past eight years of his career have been fighters that stood right in front of him like Tim Bradley, Chris Algieri, Antonio Margarito, Juan Manuel Marquez and Brandon Rios. But now that Pacquiao is forced to fight elusive guys with quick hands, he’s having problems and showing his limitations as a fighter.
This goes beyond training. When an aging fighter like Pacquiao gets put in with guys that are 10 to 15 years younger than him, then it’s not surprising that he’s going to struggle because of the youth and the speed of the fighters. I don’t think this is something that Pacquiao is going to be able to change just by shutting off interviews with the media. You can put Pacquiao in a totally closed off environment to where he’s completely isolated from the outside world, and I still think he’s going to struggle against the speedy guys that they’ve brought into his camp for sparring. I’m sure he’s finding that out on his own.
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