By Dave Lahr: Well, here’s Manny Pacquiao’s big chance that he can beat a top fighter that’s in the prime of his career and not on the downward slide like many of his recent opponents in the past two years. Former WBC junior middleweight and current World Boxing Council middleweight champion Sergio Martinez (46-2-2, 25 KO’s) is willing me to come down to 154 to challenge for Pacquiao’s newly won WBC title. Martinez, 5’10”, is actually smaller than Pacquiao’s recent win over 5’11” Antonio Margarito, so there can’t be any arguments about Martinez being too big for Pacquiao.

If Pacquiao is willing to fight Margarito, then he should be agreeable to fighting Martinez, right? Of course, Martinez is talented, fast and powerful. Pacquiao could lose and probably would, but at least Pacquiao would be fighting a real junior middleweight and he would have an chance – a small one – to turn his paper WBC title into a real one by beating the fighter that was considered to be the best in the junior middleweight division earlier in this year before he beat the stuffing out of WBC/WBO middleweight champion Kelly Pavlik in April and then moved up in weight.

Martinez says “If Manny’s willing to defend his WBC super welterweight title, I would come down to 154 pounds to challenge him for it as well as allow him to challenge me for my WBC middleweight title. It would be the opportunity of a lifetime. But I’m a realist and if he feels that he is physically too small to fight me, I certainly understand that too.”

I don’t think it’s Pacquiao being too small. I think it’s more of a case of Martinez being too skilled. He’s a counter puncher and he moves well around the ring. Pacquiao is generally always matched against slow plodders, fighters that stand directly in front of him and make it easy for him. The last time Pacquiao was put in with a fighter with good skills in Juan Manuel Marquez, he went life and death with him and won by what many people saw as a gift decision. Since then. Pacquiao hasn’t come near to fighting Marquez again and still isn’t interested in fighting him again.