By Chris Williams: Trainer Freddie Roach says his fighter Manny Pacquiao (54-5-2, 38 KO’s) is about at the end of his career now with a mere three fights left in his estimation as he approaches his fight on November 23rd against fellow Top Rank fighter Brandon Rios (31-1-1, 23 KO’s) at the Cotai Arena, Venetian Resort, Macao, Macao S.A.R., China.
Pacquiao turns 35 in December, and Roach wants him to fight Juan Manuel Marquez before he retires and whoever else promoter Bob Arum can dig up for him before he calls it quits.
Roach said to Fighthubtv.com “I want Manny in an all-out fight. It’s the young vs. the old and it’s very dangerous, but that’s why I was looking for the Marquez rematch. But unfortunately we’ll continue until that fight comes around again. Win or lose, Manny only has a couple fights left in him after this one.”
I think Roach is being overly ambitious for Pacquiao. I don’t think he has three good fights him, not after the way he was knocked out by Marquez last December, and also how he looked in losing to Tim Bradley.
I see Rios knocking Pacquiao out as well next November and putting him, Roach and Arum in the position to where they’ll have to decide whether it’s worth it for Pacquiao to continue on, and risk further knockout losses, or hang up the gloves to go off into politics in the Philippines.
It’s too bad Pacquiao didn’t accept the $40 million for the Floyd Mayweather Jr. bout because that would have been nice to have instead of the $23 million he got for his last fight against Marquez.
Beyond the next fight for Pacquiao against Rios, his options for his next two fights are pretty simple ones. He’ll likely face the Tim Bradley vs. Juan Manuel Marquez winner, and then after that he’ll face whichever one he didn’t fight. I
f he loses both of those fights, which I can definitely see happening, I suppose he’ll retire. However, if those fights make him huge, huge money from the Chinese pay per view sales, I can see Pacquiao continuing with his career and just fighting whoever to make cash for as long as the Chinese fans are willing to purchase his PPV fights in large numbers.
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