By Eric Thomas: If trainer Freddie Roach has his way, Manny Pacquiao will fight a few more times and then wrap up his boxing career with a fight against Floyd Mayweather Jr. Pacquiao, 31, is taking on former welterweight champion Antonio Margarito on November 13th at the Cowboys Stadium, in Arlington, Texas, in a fight that the boxing public has thus far failed to get excited about.
Margarito apparently was picked by Pacquiao himself when his promoter Bob Arum gave Pacquiao the options of fighting either Margarito or Miguel Cotto, both of whom fight for Arum’s Top Rank team. In an article by Ronnie Nathanielsz at www. inquirer.net , Roach says “I would like to see him get a couple more fights, then get Mayweather Jr. and get out of there.”
The way that Mayweather has been talking in the media recently, I doubt he’s going to sit still long enough for Pacquiao to fight two more times before he fights him. I think Mayweather wants/needs a fight with Pacquiao as soon as possible and he’s not likely going to want to wait another year or so while Pacquiao fights more of Arum’s Top Rank stable fighters.
Pacquiao should take care of Margarito without too many problems. After that, Pacquiao will likely be fighting a rematch with Miguel Cotto, whom he already beat last by a 12th round TKO. The final opponent for Pacquiao to fight in the Top Rank stable with possibly be Julio Cesar Chavez Jr., if he’s not beaten by someone else before Pacquiao gets to him.
If Chavez Jr. is beaten, then Pacquiao could be matched up again with Margarito, because there really won’t be anyone else in the Top Rank team to put Pacquiao in with unless Arum wants to match him against junior middleweight contender Vanes Martirosyan. That’s a fight that would help out Martirosyan’s career immensely because he would become better known, even while getting destroyed by Pacquiao.
Roach wants to get a mental edge on Pacquiao’s next Margarito, saying “We are going to scare the sh** out of Margarito. That’s one thing Manny will do, he will scare people.” It seems rather pointless and beneath Pacquiao to stoop to this level for an opponent like Margarito. The guy is struggling as it is with his career, why does Roach want to have Pacquiao try and get an extra edge by scaring Margarito?
Pacquiao should be good enough to beat a guy like Margarito based on talent alone without the need for gimmicks like intimidation. That kind of thing rarely works with professional fighters at the level of Margarito. Roach might be better off focusing on trying to work on Pacquiao’s fighting technique rather than games.
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