By Chris Williams: Manny Pacquiao’s promoter Bob Arum feels that Pacquiao has the backing of the American boxing fans in his upcoming fight against Floyd Mayweather Jr.
For some reason, Arum sees the U.S public favoring Pacquiao over the highly charismatic, blinding fast and incredibly talented Mayweather in their May 2nd fight at the MGM Grand in Las Vegas, Nevada. I’m not sure how Arum has arrived at this opinion though, because Pacquiao has never brought in the kind of pay-per-view numbers that he’ll be getting for the Mayweather fight before.
It stands to reason that if the American public was backing Pacquiao in the Mayweather fight, then the public would have been backing Pacquiao in huge numbers for his recent fights against Brandon Rios, Chris Algieri and Tim Bradley. Those fights didn’t draw huge PPV numbers.
“Both guys are rated among the all-time greats whoever wins,” Arum said via Sky Sports News HQ. “If Pacquiao wins, it’s a significant victory for Filipinos and lot of people in the US. Most Americans you would think would be rooting for Mayweather, but the contrast is true. The majority of the American population is rooting for Manny.”
I don’t think that most of the Americans are rooting for Pacquiao. Arum is obviously speculating. I would say that that most of the Philippines is rooting for Pacquiao. That’s something that I could see happening, but not with the U.S. Mayweather appears to have the backing of the majority of the boxing fans due to his charisma, talent and his unbeaten record. That unbeaten record definitely helps attract fans, because Mayweather has never tasted defeat before. Boxing fans tend to back winners, and once a fighter starts losing, the interest dies off in a lot of cases.
As you know, Pacquiao does have five losses and two draws on his resumes. Those are five instances of imperfection. Fans can’t help but to notice those draws and losses each time they look at Pacquiao’s record, and each time they hear his record being announced before his fights.
Whether the boxing fans are backing Pacquiao in the U.S are not, it doesn’t matter in terms of the fight. It might be a nice security blanked for some to talk about Pacquiao having a lot of fans, but it’s not going to change anything about the fight on May 2nd. Even Pacquiao did in fact have the backing of the majority of the boxing fans in America, he’d still be out there all by himself on May 2nd when he gets inside the ring with Mayweather.
If Pacquiao doesn’t have the talent to beat Mayweather, then there’s a chance he may end up losing the fight, and he might even get clowned by Mayweather. Once the fight gets way out of hand with Mayweather dominating the action, I can see the fans jumping off the Pacquiao ship and jumping on the bandwagon with Mayweather to make sure that they’re backing a winner rather than a loser on May 2nd.
I’ve said this before and I’ll say it again, Pacquiao is going to need to bring something different for this fight against Mayweather if he wants to have a chance of beating him. Pacquiao won’t be able to beat Mayweather by bum rushing him all night long with his jumping in and jumping out style of fighting. That tired old fight strategy is too worn out, too predictable and too simplistic for Pacquiao to beat Mayweather. Pacquiao needs multiple plans that he can alternate with on May 2nd against Mayweather, but I don’t think that’s going to be possible. Pacquiao’s trainer Freddie Roach has never shown the ability to come up with different game plans for Pacquiao. It’s always been the old in and out style for Pacquiao from day one.
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