An in-depth analysis of Pacquiao-Marquez III, and who actually won

By Boxing News - 11/19/2011 - Comments

Image: An in-depth analysis of Pacquiao-Marquez III, and who actually wonBy Anthony Lee: Many of those present at the MGM Grand Garden Arena during Manny Pacquiao’s latest win over Juan Manuel Marquez seem to think that Marquez was robbed of a narrow victory. There are several reasons for this.

For starters, Marquez caught Pacquiao with more than a few crisp counterpunches, and we are not really accustomed to seeing the Manny Pacquiao of late being hit with so many clean punches.

Secondly, Marquez fans were more vocal after the fight than the Pacquiao fans, and for good reason. If you were a Pacquiao fan, you were most likely expecting Marquez to suffer a brutal knockout loss, or at least some kind of lop-sided decision loss. But if you watched the fight in its entirety and saw the Filipino champ struggle like he did for all twelve rounds, you might have been left a bit perplexed. Speaking for myself, though I did not expect a knockout win for Pacquiao, I was somewhat at a loss for words after the fight, as I was not expecting Pacquiao to have such a difficult time with Marquez this time around.

In addition, Pacquiao seemed to have a look of resignation after the fight. He wasn’t immediately celebrating, and he just looked like he was happy that the fight was over. Though this is certainly possible, I should note that for Pacquiao, this look of perceived resignation doesn’t necessarily reflect the idea that he thought he lost the fight. If you saw Pacquiao’s contest with Shane Mosley earlier this year, you might recall that Pacquiao had the same kind of demeanor post-fight that he did after fighting Marquez (and Pacquiao handed Mosley a very lop-sided decision loss in that bout). I suspect that Pacquiao’s look of resignation had less to do with the thought that he lost the fight, and more to do with the fact that he wasn’t satisfied fighting the style of his opponent. We saw this after the Mosley fight, and even to a lesser extent after the Clottey fight, where Pacquiao was mostly stone-faced and offered only a few forced smiles.

When analyzing a fight or a post-fight situation, one should appeal to reason rather than emotion, and not make off-the-cuff assertions without also looking back on what history has shown us. And history has shown us that Pacquiao isn’t necessarily stone-faced after a fight because he thinks he lost, rather perhaps because he didn’t enjoy fighting the style of his opponent.

Now, instead of using emotions and appearances to judge this fight, I will explain, using reason and statistics, why Manny Pacquiao defeated Juan Manuel Marquez in their last contest.

1. Pacquiao was the effective aggressor and displayed more ring generalship than Marquez. Part of scoring a boxing match has to do with analyzing who controls the center of the ring more often than not, and who pushes the action more. And in this last fight, it would be hardly contentious to say that Pacquiao both controlled the center of the ring, and acted as the aggressor for most of the fight.

2. Pacquiao finished stronger. Another important aspect of judging a fight is discerning which fighter finished stronger. And it is hard to make a case against the idea that Pacquiao took the last three rounds from Marquez. Statistically, he not only landed more total punches in these last three rounds, but he landed more power shots. Marquez, for whatever reason (perhaps because he was tired or thought he was ahead on the scorecards), stopped fighting in the last three rounds. He let Pacquiao shoot in, pepper him with shots, and then back out, largely unopposed.

3. Pacquiao landed more punches than Marquez. He not only landed more jabs than Marquez, but he landed more power punches as well. This is an objective fact, corroborated by the official CompuBox PunchStat Report.
But not only did Pacquiao land more overall punches than Marquez, he also won more individual rounds as well, and I’ll show you why:

ROUND 1: PACQUIAO. I scored this round for Pacquiao. Both fighters were feeling each other out, but Pacquiao was fighting a bit more intelligently and outpunched Marquez at 11 to 7.

ROUND 2: MARQUEZ. I scored this round charitably for Marquez, even though Pacquiao landed more total punches at 9 to 8. I scored the round this way because Marquez landed the better power punches and effectively held his ground in the center of the ring.

ROUND 3: MARQUEZ. Both fighters landed the same amount of punches (10), but Pacquiao landed more power punches. When the punch stats are even, I always value power punches higher than jabs, because they are more devastating, and they are more difficult to land. I still gave this round to Marquez because he held his ground and displayed crisp counter-punching ability.

*(I should note that at this point, many people could have easily scored the bout 3-0 for Pacquiao, but I was determined to give Marquez every benefit of the doubt in this fight, so I had it 2-1 for Marquez).

ROUND 4: PACQUIAO. Pacquiao landed more total punches at 15-12, and also landed more power punches. He also displayed more ring generalship than Marquez, and controlled the center of the ring effectively. There is no way this round could have gone to Marquez.

ROUND 5: MARQUEZ. Pacquiao was the aggressor and also outpunched Marquez 13-12, but I charitably scored this round for Marquez, as he landed the slightly more emphatic power punches.

ROUND 6: PACQUIAO. Pacquiao outpunched Marquez 15-10. He was the aggressor, displayed more ring generalship, and landed more emphatic power punches. There is no way this round could have gone to Marquez.

ROUND 7: PACQUIAO. Pacquiao outpunched Marquez 21-10 and beat him in every category. He also finished the round strong with a hard power shot that hurt Marquez. There is no way this round could have gone to Marquez.

ROUND 8: PACQUIAO. This is actually the first round that Marquez actually landed more punches than Pacquiao (Marquez’s 13 to Pacquiao’s 11), but Pacquiao finished strong and landed the more crisp power punches. Many boxing analysts (including ringside commentators Jim Lampley and Emmanuel Steward) thought Pacquiao won this round, as it seemed Pacquiao was able to hurt Marquez more.

ROUND 9: MARQUEZ. This was a very close round. Pacquiao and Marquez landed the same amount of total punches (17), with Pacquiao landing one more power punch than Marquez. Even though Pacquiao was the aggressor, I charitably gave the round to Marquez for his sharp counterpunching.

ROUND 10: PACQUIAO. Pacquiao outpunches Marquez 18-13 overall, and 13-9 in power punches. Marquez started slowing down and seemed somewhat tired.

ROUND 11: PACQUIAO. Pacquiao outpunched Marquez 18-13 overall, and 15-9 in power punches. Marquez became more sluggish, and his punches were sloppy and lacking precision. Pacquiao, on the other hand, seemed stronger, and his power punches were connecting with authority.

ROUND 12: PACQUIAO. Pacquiao outpunched Marquez 18-11 overall, and 10-6 in power punches. I don’t know if Marquez thinks he’s winning, or if he’s simply tired out, but Pacquiao was still energetic and was throwing the sharper, heavier punches. This might have been Marquez’s sloppiest round (his punches were wild, and he often found himself off balance).

And there you have it. If we analyze this fight round by round, leaving aside our personal feelings on the matter, we will see that Pacquiao was the effective aggressor in the fight, displayed better ring generalship and held the center of the ring more often than not, threw and landed more punches overall, and was only outpunched by Marquez in a single round the whole fight (a statistical fact).

I scored the fight 116-112 for Pacquiao. Throughout the course of the fight, Marquez only outpunched Pacquiao in round 8. In every other round, Pacquiao either landed more punches than Marquez, or the same amount of punches as Marquez (which happened in two rounds). But because Marquez sometimes landed cleaner, more authoritative punches, I gave Marquez some extra rounds (2, 3, 5, and 9). But I don’t see how rounds 4, 6, 7, 8, 10, 11, and 12 could have gone any way but for Pacquiao. All of the rounds I scored for Marquez (2, 3, 5, and 9), on the other hand, could have easily gone for Pacquiao, as he actually outpunched Marquez in them. At any rate, even if we charitably granted Marquez the first round, the score still would have been 115-113 for Pacquiao.

I think how the fight was scored would have been more evident to people if they weren’t previously acquainted with Pacquiao or Marquez. If these were just two unknown fighters making their professional debuts, I think the result would have been more clear to see; but because many people have come to expect so much from Manny Pacquiao, they ended up giving Marquez more rounds than he actually won.



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