By Andrew Morrow: Recently, Miguel Cotto was ruled out of the Manny Pacquiao sweepstakes. Miguel’s lawyer stated that the issue of a catchweight was the main probably, with Miguel unwilling to drop down to 150 lbs to face the Filipino icon. I was rather disappointed to read some of the comments on this website calling Miguel Cotto a coward. In this article I aim to give my opinion on the issue.

First and foremost Cotto is not a coward. Here we have a three-weight world champ who has an exciting fighting style. He was an undefeated light welterweight world champion who avoided nobody. Likewise at welterweight he was a fierce force and ripped his way through the division. He even took on the feared Antonio Margarito, who was described as the most avoided man in the sport.

We all know what happened there. At welterweight, he also fought Pacquiao, albeit at a catchweight of 145 lbs, which almost certainly affected Miguel’s performance. Also at Light middleweight, Cotto took on Margarito in a grudge match, something which took balls considering the beating that the Mexican gave him in their first fight. So therefore to call Cotto a coward because he would not bow down to the Filipinos terms is outrageous and an insult to one of the greatest fighters of this generation.

But what of Manny himself? When the pair fought at welterweight for Miguel’s WBO title a catch weight of 145 lbs, this was put in place to supposedly create a more level playing field for the naturally smaller Pacquiao. Fair enough I hear some of you saying. However, consider this: In Pacuqiao’s fights against Shane Mosley, Joshua Clottey and Tim Bradley, THERE WAS NO CATCHWEIGHT!! The welterweight limit of 147 lb applied. So why was one needed against Cotto? I’ll tell you what I think. It was possibly because Miguel, although he had recently taken a beating from Margarito, was still a threat to Pacquiao due to his explosive punching power, so Manny could have needed to gain an advantage, hence the catchweight. The catchweight could have been needed to weaken Cotto to be certain of victory for Pacquiao. If Pacquiao is too small for welterweight then why was there no catchweight in place for the Mosley, Clottey, or Bradley fights? Was it because Manny all of a sudden got bigger? I’ll tell you why, in opinion,-because none of these fighters were a threat to Manny so HE DID NOT NEED THIS ADVANTAGE!! If we are to believe he needs a catchweight to create a level playing field then there should be one for EVERY fight, not just against the more dangerous guys. Also the need for catchweights begs the question, if Manny is too small for welterweight then why not move down to light welterweight?

Recently, Manny wanted a 150 lb catchweight fight with Cotto, which Cotto wisely turned down. He learned from his previous mistake of letting Pacquiao beat him at the negotiation table. Manny’s fans when talking about the Cotto fight at welter often say that a few pounds don’t matter to these guys and this begs the question, why have catchweights at all if its only a few pounds? Why not step up and face Cotto at light middle with no catchweight?

Floyd Mayweather Junior, as flawed as he is, recently stepped up to face Cotto at 154lb. Manny’s fans point out that Pacquiao is not a natural light middleweight, but neither was Floyd. He weighed in at 151lb against Cotto and 150lb against Oscar but he still won those fights so one would assume that the so called greatest fighter in the world could do the same? I doubt it somehow. Cotto would likely annihilate Pacquiao at a non-catchweight light middleweight fight.