By Kwame Cinquez: Manny Pacquiao is a great fighter, of that there is simply no disputing. His exciting style, willingness to to take a shot, speed, alongside his accuracy and brutal power have set him aside as one of the marquee names in our beautiful sport. However, i fail to accept i can be the only person on the planet (bar team Mayweather) who have not failed to acknowledge more than a few discrepancies in his rise to power. Pacquiao, whose brutal defeat of Marco Antonio Barrera on November 16th 2003 set him on his path to global stardom. This victory however, was at 126 pounds and also considered by many pre-fight to be a significant jump for a fighter who had started at 106 pounds (Light flyweight). Nonetheless, the victory was a significant one, and his meteoric rise can undoubtedly be linked to that emphatic destruction of the baby faced assassin.
His controversial draw against Juan Manuel Marquez, an excellent counter-puncher in his prime, highlighted Pacquiao’s deficiencies against boxers with a strict defence and countering. The way in which Morales was able to recover from the early knockdowns to claim a more than credible draw also highlights that in 2004 Manny simply did not have the destructive power to obliterate opponents of the highest quality. Pacquiao also failed initially to overcome the now-retired Erik Morales, losing the initial fight to a man who has never boxed above Junior Lightweight, and being comprehensively outsmarted during the first encounter. Whilst the the latter fights of the trilogy resulted in comprehensive wins for Pacquiao, Morales had lost badly to Zahir Raheem at lightweight and had faded greatly from the initial bout, so perhaps these victories cannot be considered as a true reflection of a peak Morales.
It is from this point however, that we must truly dissect Pacquiao’s career in the light of his recent spat with Floyd Mayweather Jr and the allegations of performance enhancing supplements. His victory against Oscar de la Hoya came against a fighter way past his prime, but still no disgrace as a fighter. He was quite simply obliterated by the perfect correlation of speed and power. The same De la hoya who has shared a ring with Shane Mosley, Ike Quartey, Floyd Mayweather, Julio Cesar Chavez and Bernard Hopkins was simply torn apart by a smaller man, who had risen from light flyweight.
His victory over Ricky Hatton was perhaps more straightforward, but nontheless still emphatic and noticeable for the disparity in power between the fighters. For me however, i became truly concerned about the manner of Pacquiao’s victories in the aftermath of the Cotto fight. The defeat of Cotto was perhaps the most comprehensive of all the fights i have ever witnessed that Manny participate in. Cotto who TKO’d by Antonio Margarito (who was later disgraced over the Mosley-hand wrapping scandal) in July 2008 was savagely beaten by Pacquiao, despite sharing the ring with hard hitters who are natural welterweights such as Joshua Clottey and Shane Mosley. To me, it appeared incredulous that a man who started boxing at 106 could be not only destroying fighters at welterweight, but also gaining in speed during his ascension through the weight classes. It simply defies logic.
I may well be overly cynical in my analysis of the data available to me, but it appears quite clear that in any sporting discipline, rigorous drug testing is applied to prevent any abuses of steroid or performance enhancing supplements. In athletics, stringent Olympic testing has put paid to many of its most famous stars, from Marion Jones to Ben Johnson. Others such as Usain Bolt have been stringently tested due to their extraordinary performances in their discipline. For him to simply refuse such testing on the grounds that it strains him mentally and finds it difficult to draw blood is simply ridiculous as an excuse, and would not be acceptable in any other sport. If Roger Federer or Serena Williams in tennis attempted such nonsense they would instantly be banned from the sport. Others, such as Rio Ferdinand in football and Christine Ohuruogu in track, have had significant bans for simply missing tests, let alone failing them.
Many will point to the issue of Olympic style drug testing not being compulsory in boxing, however this is missing the point. If there is an opportunity to ensure we have a dope-free fight, with testing procedures widely accepted in the majority of popular sports, there seems no credible reason for that to be denied in what will surely be one of the highest grossing fights in history. Mayweather’s decision to fight Shane Mosley also discredits the popular notion that he only fights smaller men, with arguably the hardest fight in his career to date.
Famous cases of fighters who have gone though the ranks without losing power include James Toney and Evander Holyfield, the former failing drugs tests at heavyweight and the latter having been linked with pharmaceutical companies long known to provide athletes with steroids. It is with this history in mind that i cannot blame Mayweather for a) being slightly sceptical and b) demanding tests that are pretty much standard fare in any other sport. I simply fail to understand the criticism levelled at Mayweather for what appears a legitimate request in competitive bout.
I for one am a huge fan of Manny Pacquiao for all that he brings to our sport, but i cannot and will not allow this to cloud my judgement. For any of his future fights to have any credibility, he must now agree to submit to the doping regulations that PBF proposed. Anything less, and not unlike Barry Bonds, he will forever be tainted with the allegations of steroid use. Boxing, with its myriad of competing bodies, questionable scorecards and constant mismatch of fighters, has long been losing its lustre in the eyes of many boxing fans. We must attempt to rid all levels of the discipline of any apparent flaws, including the obvious lack of testing for boxing to be re-established as the marquee sport.
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