Manny Pacquiao vs. Floyd Mayweather Jr?

How did we get here?

I originally wrote this post back in May when Floyd came out of retirement, but I thought with a little updating it was perfect to repost.

Not too long ago it seemed like after every fight I watched the winning fighter would call out Floyd Mayweather Jr., while Experts and fans alike had differing opinions on who should get a crack at the reigning pound-for-pound champ. All signs now point to a show-down with the "little man that could" Manny Pacquiao. Did "Pretty Boy" actually help himself out by disappearing for a little while?


The names of Miguel Cotto, Antonio Margarito, Paul Williams, Shane Mosley, Juan Manuel Marquez, and Manny Pacquiao were all being thrown out there. Not to mention some thought Hatton deserved a second shot at the undefeated fighter. If Floyd hadn't retired would we have gotten to this point?

Here are some big fights that have lead to a Mayweather Jr. - Pacquiao showdown:


December 12th 2008: Floyd Mayweather Jr. vs. Ricky Hatton
Mayweather Jr. lands a perfect left hook on Ricky Hatton's jaw to knock him out in the 10th.

February 9th 2008: Carlos Quintana vs. Paul Williams
Quintana upsets Williams by unanimous decision, and takes his WBO title. We start to wonder if Williams was just a bit overrated.

March 15th 2008: Manny Pacquiao and Juan Manuel Marquez II
In a spectacular fight Pacquiao walks away with a Split Decision win (many experts and fans thought it could have gone the other way, I had Pacquiao winning). It gives Pacquiao an edge against his arch nemesis with the win, either way I think most look forward to a third encounter.

April 24th 2008: Antonio Margarito vs. Kermit Cintron II
Margarito once again owns Kermit Cintron and KO's him 6 rounds. Cintron has lost a chance at Floyd with this outing. Margarito has the masses talking again.

June 6th 2008: Floyd Mayweather Jr. vs. Retirement
The retirement would cancel the upcoming Delohaya-Mayweather II bout scheduled for September. Oscar is left without an obvious Mega-fight and has to look outside the welterweights.

June 7th 2008: Paul Williams vs. Carlos Quintana II
Williams erases the only defeat from his record with the one round destruction of Carlos Quintana, Williams is back in our good graces.

June 28th 2008: Manny Pacquiao vs. David Diaz
Pacquiao successfully moves up in weight and has arguably the best showing of his career by thoroughly dismantling 135lb champ David Diaz inside of 9 rounds. Word on the street is Paquiao is the new pound-for-pound champ.(Does that sound hip?)

July 26th 2008: Antonio Margarito vs. Miguel Cotto
Margarito stops Miguel Cotto in the 11th round of a spectacular fight. Cotto suffers his first loss, and is no longer seen as the unstoppable machine he had looked like in his past few bouts.

September 13th 2008: Juan Manuel Marquez vs. Joel Casamayor
Marquez takes on cagey southpaw veteran Joel Casamayor in his first fight at Lightweight, and takes him out in the 11th of a solid fight. Marquez continues his climb up the pound-for-pound ranks, and stalks a third fight with Pacquiao.

September 27th 2008: Shane Mosley vs. Ricardo Mayorga
Shane Mosley KO's Ricardo Mayorga in the last seconds of surprisingly entertaining twelve round fight. The scorecards were pretty close, and it seemed as if Mosely was finally starting to show some signs of aging.

December 6th 2008: Manny Pacquiao vs. Oscar Delahoya
Pacquiao man-handles the much bigger Oscar Delahoya, and gets the TKO in the 8th round. Pacquiao sends Delahoya into retirement, and is now widely considered the best pound-for-pound fighter in the world. (Many considered him before, but after this fight there was no question).

January 24th 2009: Shane Mosley vs. Antonio Margarito
Shane Mosley puts on one of the best performances of his career and goes almost untouched while delivering an embarrassing beating to Antonio Margarito, stopping him in the 9th. Previous to the fight Margarito was found to have padding in his hand-wraps, it was later revealed those pads were indeed Plaster-of-Paris. This puts into puts into question all of his previous wins.

February 28th 2009: Juan Manual Marquez vs. Juan Diaz
Marquez would put on a stellar performance in what would be a front runner for fight of the year, stopping Diaz in the 9th. Marquez continues his rightful quest to take on Pacquiao for a third time.

April 11th 2009: Paul Williams vs. Winky Wright
Williams completely out hustles and out classes the usually hard to handle Winky Wright, taking home a one-sided unanimous Decision. This was just the 3rd time Williams has fought over the Welterweight limit and his 2nd fight at Middleweight. Williams has been so good at Middleweight, do we really want him to move down again?

May 2nd 2009: Manny Pacquiao vs. Ricky Hatton
Pacquiao shows the world why he is now called the best fighter in the world. He may have sent his second superstar into retirement, this time with a flush left hook to the jaw in the 2nd round. Ricky Hatton can kiss his rematch with Floyd Jr. goodbye.

July 18th 2009: Floyd Mayweather Jr. vs. Juan Manuel Marquez
Mayweather steps out of retirement and steps back in the ring to take on another pound for pound ranked fighter in Juan Manuel Marquez. Floyd was the much bigger fighter, but Marquez was still a tough test considering Floyd had been off for two years. Mayweather puts on an amazing display off boxing skill for twelve rounds. He completely out boxes another master technician and announces to the boxing world he is back and ready to reclaim his thrown as pound for pound king.

November 14 2009: Manny Pacquiao vs. Miguel Cotto
In a bold move Pacquiao stays at the around the Welterweight division and challenges for his record seventh world title against what is by most to be considered his toughest test.(I thought he would simply wait for Mayweather to beat Marquez). Pacquiao dominates and punishes the bigger fighter in Cotto, and proves to boxing fans that he is not just a great fighter, but an all-time great fighter. Pacquiao continues a streak unlike anything I've ever seen, stopping his fourth world class fighter in a row.


TBA: Manny Pacquiao vs. Floyd Mayweather Jr.
I don't think I'm going out on a limb by saying that this one will get done. This is the fight that fans, fighters, and even my mom wants to see. There is too much money to be made for both fighters and evreyone involved in the event for this not to happen.

So there you have it, some of the big things that have happened in boxing between "Pretty Boy's" destruction of Hatton and Pacquiao's instant classic against Cotto. If I had said a few years ago that Manny Pacquiao and Floyd Mayweather Jr. should fight people would have laughed at me, but now it's the only fight fans want to see.

Long story short, The Pacquiao-Mayweather fight is the only fight in boxing that MUST happen. All it took was a two year hiatus, a violent spree of KO's from Pacquiao, some crappy undercards, and few PPV's!

FINAL THOUGHTS ON PACQUIAO - COTTO

I fully apologize to the Pacmaniacs out there for underestimating their man; he put on quite a show and proved that he is truly an all-time great fighter. I have always had only one rule in boxing; never bet against Bernard Hopkins, well I think my second rule in boxing may have to be never bet against Manny Pacquiao. That may not be quite as big an honor as your seventh title in as many weight classes, but it’s the best I can do. So again, I’m sorry; I fully see the errors of my way.

I thought that Miguel Cotto’s corner completely let him down Saturday night. At several points in the fight I felt bad for Cotto starting around the 3rd round when all he was being told was “come on, box, come on”, I may be wrong but I would think you should have more to say to him than that. He needed some advice on what to do, and what to stay away from at that point. Don’t get me wrong, I don’t think it would have changed the outcome, but I’m sure it could not have hurt anything. I also thought letting the fight go past the ninth round was somewhat inhuman, Cotto was in full retreat mode, and it was obvious he was just trying to survive. He had taken quite a beating up to that point, as his corner it’s your job to protect the fighter, and take the decision out of his hands. Cotto is a proud fighter and he didn’t want to quit, it was Santiago’s job to say enough is enough.

I was actually entertained through out the Yuri Foreman – Daniel Santos fight. I was happy for Foreman and I’m glad he took the title, he deserved with his performance. Santos deserved to loose it just for coming in the way he did. I was sure that would be the worst fight of the night, instead Julio Cesar Chavez Jr gets that honor. I have always cut Chavez Jr. some slack for fighting less than stellar competition because he didn’t have much of an amateur background, but now it’s a little ridiculous. I wonder if a talked about fight between John Duddy and Chavez Jr will actually happen now.

I thought the scrap between Alfonso Gomez and Jose Soto-Karass was decent. It seemed like it was just starting to heat up when Gomez got the cut. I know that Gomez will never be a star fighter, but I would watch him on any undercard.