By Chris Williams: Manny Pacquiao (57-6-2, 38 KOs) really showed his age in his last fight against Floyd Mayweather Jr. last May. It’s impossible to look at the Mayweather-Pacquiao fight without thinking that Pacquiao is ready to be finished off and sent into retirement with a vicious beat down by his next opponent.
Pacquiao has injury problems now with his shoulder having been supposedly injured during his loss to Mayweather. Pacquiao has had surgery to repair a torn rotator cuff in his right shoulder, and we’re already hearing that he could be back in the ring by as early as February 2016. That’s only nine months after his surgery.
With an injury as serious as a torn rotator cuff, you would think that he would need at least 12 months, possibly more for Pacquiao to come back from it. But even if Pacquiao does come back 100% from the injury, I still don’t think it matters.
“We were planning for Manny Pacquiao to fight at the end of February, or at the latest, the first two weeks in April,” Arum told the Sunday Telegraph. “I know there was a report that Khan was coming here to make a deal with Ruslan Provodnikov, but he ensured me that was not the case.”
At 36, Pacquiao looks like a shell of the fighter that he was back in 2009, when he was knocking out the likes of Miguel Cotto and Oscar De La Hoya. Pacquiao now fights like he’s afraid to get hit hard by punches, and that tells me that he’s gotten old and is possibly still haunted by his KO loss to Juan Manuel Marquez.
I think Pacquiao is going to take on a tough opponent in his next fight and it’s going to be a disaster for him. His promoter Bob Arum isn’t going to match him softly for his next fight, and that’s obviously a bad sign. Pacquiao’s only wins since his loss to Marquez in 2012 has come against flawed fighters like Brandon Rios, Tim Bradley, and Chris Algieri. Those are B level fighters, and not in the class of the guys that Arum is looking to pick from for Pacquiao’s next fight.
It looks like Arum is going for broke in wanting to match Pacquiao against Amir Khan. That’s a fight that I can see Pacquiao getting badly schooled in. I think Khan will make Pacquiao look as bad as Pacquiao made Oscar De La Hoya look in their fight in 2008. Khan won’t let Pacquiao tough him, and it could be really embarrassing for Pacquiao to get dominated and sent into retirement.
“I’m not saying necessarily that the negotiations will be successful,” Arum said. “While those negotiations are going on, I’m not going to discuss any other opponent for Manny Pacquiao. I’m in the process of having negotiations with Amir Khan’s uncle and his lawyer, Robert Davis, and those negotiations are ongoing,” Arum said.
So there it is in a nutshell. Arum says he’s not going to start negotiations with any other fighters until he exhausts his efforts in trying to put together a fight between Pacquiao and Khan. I think the chances of a fight between the two fighters are very good because Khan wants the fight so badly. He believes he’s catching Pacquiao at the right time of his career with him coming off of a loss to Floyd Mayweather Jr.
Pacquiao might not retire if he gets beaten by Khan, because he’d still technically have more time left in 2016 for him to slip in one more fight before his contract ends and he goes off into retirement. But I think Khan might finish Pacquiao off as a serious fighter and for him to think seriously about retiring early.
The last thing that Pacquiao needs is three straight losses to end his career, because I think that might hurt his political career. But I think if Arum does choose to match Pacquiao tough for both of his fights in 2016, then I think he’ll lose both of the fights and wind up being a finished fighter ready for scrap heap to be decommissioned from the sport.
If Arum was clever, he’d pick out another easy mark on the level of Algieri and Rios so that Pacquiao can get a nice comfortable fight and an easy pay day. Yes, his PPV buys would likely suffer if Arum picks out an easy mark, but at least he wouldn’t be beaten again.
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