Another "Fighter of the Decade Award" for Manny Pacquiao?

By Teodoro Medina Reynoso

Winning seven of his record eight world boxing championships ( he won his first in 1998) in the process getting named boxer of the year thrice made Manny Pacman Pacquiao the hands down Fighter of the Decade in 2000-2009.

This despite a points defeat to archrival Erik Morales which he more than avenged by knocking out the Mexican in their two rubber matches and two earlier draws against Agapito Sanchez in a unification bout and another bitter rival Juan Manuel Marquez whom he manage to outpoint in their rematch in 2008.

And despite American multi division world champion Floyd Mayweather Jr. remaining undefeated during the same period prior to his retirement in 2007 and comeback in 2009. Floyd just won one boxer of the year award during that stretch and that plus his first retirement probably weakened his case

With Pacquiao’s recent near incredible victory over erstwhile undefeated WBA welterweight super champion Keith One Time Thurman earning for him that same title, Manny has put himself in a strong position for another run at the Fighter of the Decade award.

His decade record of 12 wins and 4 losses on paper may look weak given that his biggest rival Floyd Mayweather remained spotless as was another American superstar champion Andre Ward despite near losses to Marcos Maidana and Sergey Kovalev respectively.

But Manny’s advantage is that he remains active for the greater part of 2010-2019 while Floyd and Ward fought sparingly before finally hanging their gloves a little past midpoint of the furrent decade.

His gallery of opponents also compares well with those two closest rivals for the award. It includes names as Joshua Clottey, Antonio Margarito, Sugar Shane Mosley, Timothy Bradley, Juan Manuel Marquez, Brandon Rios, Chris Algieri, Mayweather himself, Jessie Vargas, Jeff Horn Lucas Matthyse, Adrian Broner and Thurman who were all except Horn, former or reigning world champions when he fought them, a few more than once.

True, he lost clearly to Marquez whom he beat earlier in their third bout and Floyd. But Manny was breaking down the Mexican when he got careless and Juan Ma got lucky with that Hail Mary punch. He was hobbled by that shoulder injury in the Floyd super fight and he was denied a therapeutic use exemption (TUE) to manage it during the fight while the same was given to Floyd for his irregular intravenous rehydration after the official weigh in.

His two other losses to Bradley in their first fight and Horn were highly controversial and questionable.

He erased any doubts about his superiority over Bradley by beating up the American in their two rubber matches.

Fans agree there is no need for a rematch versus Horn for they know who really won their fight held in Australia where Horn got all the breaks from the errant supposed neutral referee.

Pacquiao also more than made up for his unflattering ring record during the period with his comparative better activity and durability that astonishes the skeptics and even his harshest critics that include veteran scribes and experts in the USA.

His latest ring exploits against Broner and especially Thurman affirmed his status as boxing’s still biggest draw and money maker with the retirement of Floyd Jr.

His bout against Broner generated 400,000 buys on pay per view and his latest versus Thurman is expected to breach the 800,000 mark. Significantly, he shared with Floyd Jr the standing record of 1.6 million ppv buys in their super fight held in 2015.

Not even Canelo Alvarez, Gennady Golovkin and certainly Terrence Crawford and Vasily Lomachenko, today’s supposed biggest names could command and maintain such following in and outside of America.

Outside of Floyd and Ward, Manny’s other perceived rivals for the Fighter of the Decade 2010-2019 award as given by the Boxing Writers Association of America (BWAA) and also by the Ring Magazine are Canelo, Golovkin and former pound for pound topnotcher Chocolatito Gonzales.

Let us pray for a back to back Fighter of the Decade for our Pambansang Kamao.

The author Teodoro Medina Reynoso is a veteran Boxing Radio Talk Show Host at Sports Lang Radio RP 2 Aired every Saturday from 3 PM to 5 PM on 918 AM.