By Chris Williams: Manny Pacquiao (54-5-2, 38 KO’s) appears headed for a rematch with Juan Manuel Marquez (55-6-1, 40 KO’s) despite the dangers involved for the Filipino should he take this fight.
Pacquiao was badly knocked out on December 8th by Marquez and with this kind of knockout you won’t know what’s going to happen with Pacquiao until he gets in the ring again.
Much of the blame for Pacquiao’s loss has to Marquez has to rest on the shoulders of his trainer Freddie Roach, because he’s the one after all that came up with the strategy for him to fight with more aggression in that fight in the belief that it would enable Pacquiao to fight like he did earlier in his career when he was a more energetic and successful fighter.
However, what Roach didn’t realize is that Pacquiao is older now, heavier and less able to fight with the speed that he had then. By pushing Pacquiao to fight with more aggressiveness it led him to get knocked completely out by Marquez.
So you have to put the blame on Roach this time around more so than Pacquiao despite the fact that it was him that lost the fight, but it was Roach’s fault for coming up with such a poor plan to try and beat Marquez.
I can’t imagine that Roach will have Pacquiao fighting with aggressiveness in the 5th fight because he’ll not want to take any chances that Pacquiao might walk into a big shot that leads to him getting knocked out. I expect Roach to have a really conservative game plan next time. He can’t have Pacquiao fighting like he’s a spring chicken anymore because he’s not capable of doing it anymore.
I think Bob Arum, Pacquiao’s promoter, should get a lot of the blame if Pacquiao gets beaten next year against Marquez because he’s the one that really wants this fight and he should be the voice of reason to be trying to talk Pacquiao out of taking this fight due to the inherent dangers that are there due to his bad knockout loss. Arum should be pushing Pacquiao to have a couple of tune-up fights to see where he’s at mentally and physically after being knocked out.
Arum doesn’t have any interest in matching Pacquiao soft, as he feels that there’s no need for that for some reason. Since it’s not him that’s getting hurt if Pacquiao gets knocked out, I think it’s a lot easier for him to match Pacquiao up against dangerous opponents when he should be playing a wait and see type approach with him.
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