By John F. McKenna (McJack): In the lead up to next Saturday nights matchup at the MGM Grand Arena in Las Vegas between twice beaten World Boxing Association (WBA) light middleweight champion Miguel Cotto (37-2, 30 KO’s) and undefeated superstar WBC welterweight champion Floyd Mayweather Jr. (42-0, 26 KO’s) promoters, boxing writers and fans have attempted to build up the chances of Cotto to hand “Pretty Boy” his first loss.
Cotto suffered his first loss when he was literally beaten down and stopped by Antonio Margarito in the 11th round in July 2008. Margarito took Miguels’s heart and soul in the beating he inflicted on Cotto in that fight. Six months later it was discovered prior to Antonio’s fight with Shane Mosley that his gloves were allegedly illegally loaded. Mosley trainer Nazim Richardson made the discovery just moments before the fight. Instead of winning the fight against Mosley as was expected, Antonio was battered around the ring and finally stopped in the 9th round.
Obviously the Cotto camp began suspecting that the illegal wraps may also have been used by Margarito when he destroyed Miguel in eleven rounds six months prior. In any case, the loss Cotto suffered against Margarito left long lasting damage to his psyche. He lost a great deal of the self confidence which had propelled him to stardom.
The 12 round TKO loss Cotto suffered at the hands of Manny Pacquiao in November 2009 only served to increase the self doubt Miguel had about his own ability as a fighter.
Camp Cotto went about launching a rebuilding campaign for Miguel.
As part of the rebuilding process for Cotto he moved up in weight and won the WBA light middleweight title against Yuri Foreman. Next he stopped Ricardo Mayorga. And finally he exorcised the demon of Antonio Margarito via 10th round stoppage last December.
But realistically Cotto’s victories over Foreman and Mayorga proved little. Even Miguel’s “Redemption” win over Margarito was hollow at best. If there is one fighter who is predictable and easy to prepare for it is Antonio Margarito. He bores straight in non stop with the sole purpose of inflicting damage to his foes. And Antonio was clearly damaged goods after having his right eye surgically repaired after his one sided loss to Manny Pacquaio.
You did not need to be a boxing version of Einstein to devise a game plan to defeat Margarito. Move side to side when he comes at you, while peppering his damaged eye with sharp combinations. Predictably ringside physicians would stop the fight at the first hint of damage to Antonio’s surgically repaired eye. That is exactly what happened.
Defeating the likes of Foreman, Mayorga and Margarito does not make you an elite fighter.
In case you hadn’t noticed, Floyd Mayweather Jr. was reluctant to trash talk Cotto at first. It was more important from Mayweather’s point of view to make it appear as though Miguel really has a chance to defeat him. Instead Floyd built up Cotto by saying that in his eyes Miguel is undefeated because of the way he lost to Margarito and Pacquiao.
Of course those comments are not what Floyd believes. He made those remarks for the sole purpose of appealing to Cotto’s very large Puerto Rican fan base. The insinuation that Cotto lost to Pacquiao because he was weight drained is silly and absurd. It’s Floyd being Floyd in his attempt to drive up the Pay Per View numbers by making Miguel appear better than he really is.
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