By Chris Williams: One got a sense that trainer Freddie Roach was going up the wrong avenue by telling his fighter Manny Pacquiao (54-5-2, 38 KO’s) that he had to go back to the “old Manny” and that he had to be more aggressive for his fourth fight with Juan Manuel Marquez (54-6-1, 40 KO’s).
As it turns out, that was a disastrous plan as Pacquiao ran right into a huge right hand by Marquez and was knocked out cold last night. It’s hard to believe that an expert trainer like Roach would have Pacquiao fighting in such reckless manner because that kind of fighting approach had already led to Pacquiao losing other fights earlier in his career before he changed his style to be a little more cautious.
At the same time Pacquiao isn’t the young fighter that he once was, so Roach telling Pacquiao to try and be the aggressive “old Manny” was a terrible mistake that led directly to him being brutally knocked out by Marquez.
Roach told Radio Raheem about Pacquiao’s fight strategy for the Marquez fight: “That’s my strategy. If you want to blame someone for losing you can blame me. He [Pacquiao] made a mistake and he paid for it. He had a terrific fight up to the knockout. He walked into one, what I say” He got a little anxious, a little too overconfident and walked into a big right hand.”
So Roach is taking responsibility for this brilliant strategy of Pacquiao fighting with more aggression yet he’s saying that Pacquiao “made a mistake.” Is Roach taking responsibility or is he passing the buck on this? He’s saying two different things here. If you want your fighter to fight with all out aggression then of course he’s going to be walking into shots because that’s part of the price you pay for fighting with uncontrolled aggression.
Roach is really having problems now with his top fighter and you have to put a lot of them blame on him because he is the captain of the ship. Pacquiao has now lost two straight fights, Amir Khan has also lost two consecutive fights and subsequently he’s dumped Roach, and Julio Cesar Chavez Jr. was just beaten as well. Is it time for Pacquiao to dump Roach and cut his losses to find someone that can come up with a logical game plan and teach him some skills?
At 34, Pacquiao isn’t a spring chicken but it’s not too late for him to start over with someone good like Nacho Beristain that can teach him some discipline and fix his defensive flaws.
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