Rios: Pacquiao is smaller than I thought he’d be

By Chris Williams: Former WBA lightweight champion Brandon Rios (31-1-1, 23 KO’s) met Manny Pacquiao (54-5-2, 38 KO’s) last Saturday night to hype their November 23rd fight in Macao, China. Rios and Pacquiao are traveling around China to meet with the media and fans to drum interest in this pay per view card.

After leaving China, Pacquiao and Rios will be traveling to Singapore and then the U.S to continue with the tour. Rios says he was surprised at how small Pacquiao was when he first met him.

Rios said “My first impression of meeting Manny Pacquiao in Macau was that he was smaller than I thought he would be…Manny makes a lot of mistakes and Robert [Garcia] and I will be working hard on making a plan to exploit them.”

Pacquiao has been able to beat bigger and taller fighters at times, but he also hasn’t faced the best fighter at 147 in Floyd Mayweather Jr. and 154 in Saul “Canelo” Alvarez. Pacquiao beat Antonio Margarito at a catch-weight of 150 rather than 154 to win the WBC junior middleweight title.

Pacquiao also beat Miguel Cotto at a catch-weight. If you take away Pacquiao’s catch-weight fights, you’ve got a past his best Oscar De La Hoya and Shane Mosley, as well as Joshua Clottey, two controversial wins over Juan Manuel Marquez, and a victory over Ricky Hatton. There’s not a lot of real substance among Pacquiao’s wins.

Rios. 5’8”, will have a 1 ½” height advantage over Pacquiao in this fight, but that’s not the important thing going for him in this fight. What Rios has going for him in this fight is his youth, power, weight, and chin. Without there being a catch-weight in this bout, it means that Rios won’t be drained as he’ll be moving up in weight to face Manny.

Rios will have a big weight advantage and he’ll use that weight advantage to punish Pacquiao. This won’t like Margarito, who had to drain down to 150 to take the fight. Coming up in weight will greatly benefit Rios, and he’ll be at full power when he starts nailing Pacquiao with power shots in the 1st round in their fight on November 23rd.