By Babatis Banda: They say miracles can happen, and it is the reason why people are always hopeful in the face of serious challenge. With due respect to Cotto as a man and as a fighter with the kind of record he holds, a miracle has to happen on May 5 to put a dent on Floyd’s clean slate record. If all other factors are held constant, that is, no miracles happening, Cotto is definitely finding himself in a deep-dark hole on May 5.

In the past few days, I have relished watching the Mayweather-Ortiz 24/7 series just to get into details of what boxers go through before their big bouts. Ortiz was really confident and Garcia, his trainer really tried hard to bring a sense of calm before the storm. While most boxers do well handling the pre-fight period, there is always a realization of the storm ahead of them and the danger is that it eats them right from the inside and they just fall apart on the fight night. Ortiz was a casualty of this fake courage and when he landed less than 15% of his power punches the whole four rounds, the shell just fell off and chose the easier way out. I still feel Ortiz could have gotten up if he really wanted the fight to continue, he had been nailed with punches of similar nature for the most part of the fight.

Cotto, the warrior he might be, is perfectly aware of what awaits him on May 5. First of all he has to somehow land killer punches and bring down Floyd Mayweather for the first time in his career. That may not require a miracle, but is highly unlikely. The other way would be for Cotto to outwork Floyd by boxing him. This means that he needs to have good movement, good speed and generally, he needs to work harder by throwing more punches. The second scenario is the one that really requires a miracle. I don’t see Cotto out-landing Mayweather without getting punished.

Cotto is able to throw more punches than Mayweather but finding the target might be the problem. We saw in the Ortiz bout that Mayweather really has a good defence. Out of a hail storm of six or so punches, only one or so may land cleanly and the rest smothered away and it could be demoralizing and taxing at the same time. It does not matter who Floyd is facing, out-boxing him is highly unlikely though not impossible. The issue is that Floyd has matured into even a better fighter. Casual boxing fans only see pot-shots, they don’t see how he paces himself into the latter rounds that really count and can make the difference.

We also saw that Floyd is still capable of a flurry or combination punching in the Ortiz fight, he really was starting to plaster Ortiz with left-rights and upper-cuts until the embarrassing head butt which Ortiz paid dearly for. If Floyd will not be plagued by disease, and I mean that if Floyd will be 100% healthy, Cotto needs a prayer and a miracle. Again, mark my words Cotto is being eaten inside out and the shell will fall apart on the fight night.