A fight detrimental to boxing

For the second Sunday in a row, I will put my insignificant thoughts on a subject that is off-tangent (way, way off, actually) to this column – boxing. I have decided to write on this issue before the fistic mania sweeps all of us from the more realistic world of the cautious. As the late Dean Amadeo Seno would prefer to put it “ex abudante ad cautilam”, whatever that means, huh.

The forthcoming fight between our compatriot Manny Pacquiao and Oscar de la Hoya, which was announced the other day to take place in December this year, is a match that is detrimental to boxing. I take this stand in the firm belief that those responsible in icing this deal were lured more by the expected financial windfall rather than by anything good it may bring the sport.

Money talks. On the part of Manny, he must be fully convinced that he cannot get the kind of purse he imagines to get from this single combat against Oscar than fighting any other boxer. The newspaper accounts speculate the sum between 1 and 1.5 billion pesos. And may I repeat that this is for fighting one opponent alone – Oscar.

Yes, Manny can probably amass that wealth after facing a series of three or more contests, not just one bout. His likely opponents are, in any order, Edwin Valero, Joan Guzman, Juan Miguel Marquez and Nate Campbell. But, a bout with anyone of these guys is risky, as of course, all other matches are. Judging from their fight records, Valero, et al, pack such a mean wallop that each has a chance of landing a haymaker to end all further dream of Manny’s getting to be a billionaire. For instance, should Pacquiao choose to square off first with Valero and the latter lands a lucky punch (highly remote but plausible), his marketability will diminish. Manny will kiss goodbye to a highly-prized subsequent fight.

This is also true in the case of Oscar. He should know his present limitations. To be most generous, he, after engaging the best of them in many previous championship cards, is almost past his peak. The men in the welterweight division, fighting against whom brings the multi-million dollar prize he is accustomed to, appear to be too dangerous for his well being. Englishman Ricky Hatton is perceptively more agile while Mexican Antonio Margarito, who recently toyed with Puerto Rican Miguel Cotto, will just eat him alive. Neither can he stand the surge of Kelly Pavlik in the higher division, the middleweight. 

Against our own Manny on the other hand, Oscar enjoys tremendous advantage in every possible fight aspect. He will be less exposed to harm because with his edge in height and reach, Oscar can keep Manny at bay. More importantly, their weight difference is huge. Manny has to jump up to 12 pounds. The reason for the existence of divisions with just few pounds in weight difference is the danger that a heavier (because bigger) pug poses to a lighter boxer. Perhaps many will argue on the basis of Manny’s knocking out a heavier David Diaz. That proposition will not apply. Diaz, only a division heavier by five pounds, offered himself to be an unmoving target. Had he been lighter, Diaz would have kissed the canvass by the second round.

What will be relevant was the ascent, by seven pounds, of Nicaraguan Alexis Arguello, to junior welterweight. Reigning supreme in the featherweight, junior lightweight and lightweight divisions, he thought he was heavy enough to face Aaron Pryor. His heaviest bombs only blinked the eyes of his foe. When he exhausted his artillery, he suffered a most humiliating defeat.

When boxing analysts will sit down and look objectively at the Pacquiao-de la Hoya tale of the tape, they will not fail to realize that the fight is a veritable mismatch. It will be so harmful to the person of Manny that they may not recommend seeing it. In that scenario, even the gates will be affected such that the financial expectation may not be attained.