By Glen Anglin: As the big night approaches, I am becoming more and more excited and less and less sure of the outcome. This fight is what is missing all too often in boxing: a clash of two well matched, excellent ring warriors both of whom come to fight and take pride in their performance.

Cotto has progressed steadily and racked up a good list of wins in his career. Built stockily and possessing natural looking power and strength, he has worn down many an opponent with persistent, damaging punching. Not a one-punch knockout artist so much as an irresistible ring force; a relentless, square-bodied, beat down machine who can sink a left hook to the body 6 inches deep. He scored a decision win over Shane Mosley, so far his most sparkling ring achievement. However, he has struggled in recent fights, first against the criminal Margarito and then against Joshua Clottey.

There is a common school of thought that says Cotto is damaged goods as a result of the Margarito fight. In that fight Cotto won most of the early rounds, but then seemed to fade and finally collapsed under the Margarito assault. At the end of that fight, he was a beaten, exhausted fighter. However, the entire episode is suspect, as Margarito’s hand wraps were found to have been treated with a hardening agent.

Despite this loss, I think Cotto has retained his fighting spirit and ability. He showed resilience and toughness in the Clottey fight by surviving a very bad cut and staying in the fight to win a close decision. I think he will come into the ring on November 14th in shape and ready for war.

Manny Pacquiao’s ring accomplishments are not only dazzling, they are almost unprecented. He has won titles or big fights against top competition in weight classes that spread over 30 pounds. Very few fighters in history have ever done anything like that. He has steadily improved during the last 10 years, adding a flashing right hook to his arsenal along with better upper body and foot movement. He has somehow packed onto his frame about 40 pounds of solid muscle (he actually started boxing at 106 pounds), and yet he has not lost speed or power as he moved up. The 7 or 8 knockdowns he scored (and a couple more that were not counted) against Barrera, Morales and Marquez are by themselves a hall of fame accomplishment. And how many times did they knock him down? Zero, that’s how many. (The knockdown of Pacquiao in the first Barrera fight was called incorrectly). I know he did not win all of those contests, but consider that those knockdowns came after he gradually came up in weight a full 15 pounds to fight the great Mexican trio.

Next, he climbed five more pounds to lightweight and easily beat up David Diaz for a title belt. And then came the surreal, how-can-this-be-happening defeats of ODLH and Hatton at……are you ready…. 140+ pounds. I realize that there are mitigating circumstances of the condition of those last two when they fought Manny. But the fact that impresses me most about those two wins is not that he defeated them, but HOW he defeated them. ODLH could barely even TOUCH Manny. He may have landed 5 good punches in the entire fight compared to the crate of whoop___ that was dumped on his head. As for Hatton, he was hurt several times by right hooks before the final, horrifying left cross that put him to sleep for 5 minutes; and he too, barely landed a good punch. Hatton was unconscious for almost as long as the entire fight. Both men were completely dominated, as was Diaz. These matches taught me to never bet against Pacquiao, no matter who he is facing. Until Pacquiao challenges for the cruiserweight title, you will not see me betting against him.

Pacquiao’s accomplishments to now already put him near the very top of all boxers below welterweight in history. He really has been that good.

Since I am sure that Pacquiao will be able to land effectively on Cotto, I think the deciding factor in this fight will be whether or not Cotto is able to connect consistently on Pacquiao with his power punches. If Cotto can do this, he stands a good chance to win, no matter what he receives in return from Pacquiao because he will be able to punish Pacquiao enough to win a decision or force a stoppage. However, if he keeps hitting air instead of Pacauiao, then he will be in for a long, demoralizing, splitting-headache of a night as Pacquiao will machine gun him to smithereens with his absurdly fast combinations. Cotto must land a high percentage of his power shots to win this fight.

I think that this is a pick-em fight, with neither man the obvious favorite. But if was forced to pick, I would pick Cotto. Here’s why:

There must come a point at which Manny has moved up too high. And I believe he may have reached that point now with Cotto. Cotto is a top quality, full-sized welterweight. He has the size and tools to finally stop the Pacquiao ascension. Will he do it? I can’t wait to see. JGA