By Chris Williams: Manny Pacquiao will be fighting at another catchweight for the 2nd time in his last three fights when he goes up against Antonio Margarito for the vacant WBC junior middleweight title on November 13th. This will be Pacquiao’s second fight for a title with a catchweight being used.
Pacquiao fought for the WBO welterweight title against then champion Miguel Cotto at a 145 pound catch weight last year in November rather than fighting Cotto at the full weight of 147. In November, Pacquiao will be fighting Margarito at a 151 pound catchweight rather than the full 154 pound weight limit for the division.
I don’t really understand why Pacquiao needs to be fighting at a catchweight for a title. Is it because he feels he can’t win without it and needs a handicap to win or is it something else?
I could understand a catchweight if Pacquiao was fighting a non-title fight, because it really wouldn’t matter all that much that his opponent was going to have to drain himself a little to make a smaller weight. But if it was a title eliminator or for the title, I don’t see how the WBC or any of the sanctioning bodies could allow for that.
I mean the catch weight isn’t something that’s going to be helping Margarito and certainly wasn’t something that helped then WBO welterweight champion Cotto last year when he fought Pacquiao.
Having to fight at less than the maximum weight is harder for the bigger guy. If Pacquiao doesn’t feel comfortable fighting someone at the full weight, then he’s better off not fighting for the title at all then. But I don’t see why Pacquiao needs a catchweight to fight someone like Margarito. He’s not considered to be the best fighter in the division, and has been struggling since last year. He was stopped by Shane Mosley last year, and he looked like he had lost his power in his recent 10 round decision win over Roberto Garcia this year.
If this was Sergio Martinez, Paul Williams or James Kirkland, I could kind of understand Pacquiao wanting a catch weight, because those guys are really tough and considered to be the very best in the division. Margarito is basically a welterweight, not a junior middleweight. He’s only fought twice in the junior middleweight division in the past six years, winning one and losing one.
I don’t see the need for a catch weight to fight him.
I see a catch weight victory as a tainted one. I couldn’t imagine wrestling at a catch weight when I was wrestling in high school, and for a pro boxer to be using one for a title fight seems really alien to me.
It just makes me think that anything is possible, but it seems so wrong. Is this Pacquiao’s idea for the catchweight? Pacquiao doesn’t seem like the type that would ever ask for a catch weight. I just hope this is this is the last time Pacquiao uses a catchweight for one of his fights, because I would hate to see Pacquiao going after a middleweight and then a super middleweight using a catchweight.
I think Pacquiao would huge problems against even the weakest of the middleweights with or without a catchweight, but I still would hate to see Pacquiao using another catchweight in hopes of winning a 9th world title.
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