Will we have a Part 2?

I will not go into the details of last Sunday’s fight as we had all seen, heard and read them.  What is clearer than daylight is that Sen. Manny Pacquiao is a world boxing champion AND sitting senator at the same time.  Some athletes entered politics after they retired from their sport but no other athlete living, forgotten or demised, had accomplished this feat except Pacman and this is a remarkable rarity.

It was noted that Floyd Mayweather, Jr. at the invitation of Pacman, was at ringside during the fight and as per reports, he and the senator had eye contact and acknowledged each other.  Money even gave him the thumbs up when he defeated Jessie Vargas.  That’s when the rumors and speculations spread.

Because of the two great fighters recognizing each other, wise guys now theorize and propose that a Pacman-Floyd, Jr. rematch is in the works.  Yeah right.  Eye contact and a thumbs-up sealed another sham hit-and-run type of a footrace inside the square ring.  Basing on this logic, if I had eye contact with Leila de Lima and she gave me the thumbs up, I’m already her part-time whatever?

Floyd, Jr. had visited Freddie Roach’s Wild Card gym twice, not for training but for advice.  He wants to put up a boxing gym and was soliciting opinions from Roach.  Nothing about a rematch was spoken, just business.  Yes, he and Pacman also had met previously but exchanged ideas on properly handling their careers and earnings.  Floyd, Jr. is probably a nice guy.  It could be the elder Mayweather who’s bipolar.

Pacman will be 38 next month and most fighters at this age are tired.  Just like the NBA’s LeBron James, Sen. Manny is a freak of nature.  Considering the lack of training and preparation for the fight, he’s supposed to be rusty and speed-denied, punching power diminished.  But that was not the case last Sunday and all doubts were erased.  It went the full 12 rounds and even though the bigger Vargas was tough, the undersized senator dominated him.

The last time that Pacman knocked down an opponent was on May of 2009 when he floored Ricky Hatton in the second round.  All his succeeding fights went the full distance except when he got reckless and Juan Manuel Marquez sent him to sleep at the closing seconds of the 5th round on that fateful December 2012.  But this does not lessen the fact that inspite of his age, he is still a force in boxing with a 59-6-2 win-loss-draw record including 38 knockouts.  The senator’s style is offensive aggression bordering on carelessness that he is not afraid to take risks and considers losing as part of the game. 

The same cannot be said of Mayweather, Jr.  Yes, he can be considered great but he’s more of a defensive and a perpetually back-tracking target, once in a while on the attack, landing combinations then quickly retreating.  Employing an effective sissy style, he has never been defeated and has equalled boxing legend Rocky Marciano’s 49-0 win-loss record.  The chance to break that record could be tempting but at 40-years old and not having fought for more than a year complicates things.  The corrosion will be evident and no amount of rust converters and WD-40s can restore him to his old self.  Floyd, Jr. will be preserving that undefeated distinction.

Sen. Manny has one more fight left in his contract with Top Rank.  He could be fighting sometime between March and April of next year when the senate will have a recess and recent reports say he wants to avenge that knockout loss from Marquez.  If the price is right, JuanMa just might take the bait, but it’s a long shot as he’s also in the state of oxidization.  Since retiring is far from his mind, I would prefer to see Pacman fight Terrence Crawford than anybody else.

The fighting senator becomes a free agent after this fight and he can chose whoever he wants to rumble with.   A looming fistic exchange with Money is a possibility by November when the senate has another break.

We don’t need another farcical fracas.  We rode on the crest of the tsunami called “The Battle for Greatness” and were forcefully slammed with a “Robbery of the Century”.  We were promised a great fight that never was as one fought not for greatness but for richness.  We were even lied to when we supported a supposedly 100% Pacman when in fact he had an injured shoulder.  Enough already.

Pacman according to reports, had total earnings in excess of $500 million.  Floyd on the other hand is richer by $200 million.  Combined, both fighters have earned an obscenely sacrilegious amount of more than a billion dollars.  Their immediate families will be comfortably lulled by affluence for generations to come.  They don’t anymore need the money except when greed, I’m sorry to say, dictates.