Roach: Pacquiao targeting Mayweather rematch

Boxingnews24.com

By Jeff Aranow: With an important fight against Jeff Horn this Saturday, Manny Pacquiao is still in hopes of getting a rematch against Floyd Mayweather Jr., says trainer Freddie Roach. Pacquiao and Horn will be fighting in front of a sold-out crowd of 50,000 on Saturday night on ESPN at the Suncorp Stadium in Brisbane, Australia.

The fight might seem unimportant to the boxing world, but it has a lot of stake for Pacquiao. He needs a victory over the 29-year-old school teacher Horn for him to stay in the hunt for a second fight with Mayweather. There’s a lot of money to be made for Pacquiao, but more importantly, it will help him avenge the loss.

Pacquiao was beaten by Mayweather a little over 2 years ago by a 12 round unanimous decision in May 2, 2015. Pacquiao fought with a shoulder injury that limited his effectiveness in the fight. Not long after, Pacquiao had successful shoulder surgery on his right shoulder, and he’s now good as now 2 years later.

The scores for the Mayweather-Pacquiao fight showed that things might have been different had Pacquiao been healthy. The judges scored the fight 116-112, 118-110 and 116-112. Boxing News 24 had it for Mayweather 116-112. Had Pacquiao not tweaked his shoulder early on, he might have won the fight. He was giving Mayweather problems with his speed, and pressure.

Mayweather initially spoke of being interested in giving Pacquiao a rematch, but changed his mind after hearing news about the Filipino star saying that he thought he should have won the fight. Mayweather seemed to want Pacquiao to give him credit for having beaten him. Pacquiao couldn’t do that because he thought he won the fight. Pacquiao wasn’t going to bend the truth just to make Mayweather feel happy.

Pacquiao was being honest in saying that he thought he won the fight. There was nothing wrong in that. In looking at the Mayweather-Pacquiao fight in slow motion, you can make a strong case that Pacquiao should have won the fight. He landed a lot of shots and wasn’t given credit for them. Pacquiao was also blocking many of the punches that Mayweather was throwing.

”Manny is in a must-win situation,” said Roach to the Associated Press at espn.com.” He wants a rematch with Mayweather. With Mayweather you have to look good against an opponent, you have to be impressive.”

Mayweather has a fight on August 26 against UFC champion Conor McGregor on Showtime PPV. If Mayweather wins that fight, he’ll need a big name for him to continue to make big money. It’s highly unlikely that the boxing and MMA fans will pay to see Mayweather defeat another UFC fighter if that’s the direction he wants to take.

Mayweather can’t keep dragging out UFC fighters to beat up, because it’ll make him look like he’s cherry-picking fighters with no experience in boxing to extend his career. Out of all the fighters in the boxing world, Pacquiao is the one guy that Mayweather could select and get another big payday without him having a lot of risk of getting hurt. There aren’t any big names at 140 or 147 for Mayweather to fight for the type of money he’ll be getting in fight with McGregor or his past fight against Manny.

Beyond the fight with Jeff Horn on Saturday, Pacquiao doesn’t have a lot of options at welterweight for a big payday. His promoter Bob Arum would like for him to fight Terence Crawford, but that’s a fight that would be lucky if he brought in 500,000 buys. Crawford is not a big name, even with the hardcore boxing fans. He’s not a big name. Crawford has a lot of talent, but he’s not at the level where he would bring in a significant amount of buys in a fight against Pacquiao.

“If he struggles in this fight, it could be over,” Roach said about Pacquiao’s fight with Horn this Saturday.

Pacquiao didn’t look like he was firing on all 8 cylinders in his last fight against Jessie Vargas in November last year. Pacquiao won the fight by a 12 round unanimous decision, but he seemed to have a lot from his game. Pacquiao wasn’t throwing combinations, and he was getting hit hard on the way in by Vargas.

Pacquiao got the victory by the scores 118-109, 118-109 and 114-113. It wasn’t the same Pacquiao that we’d seen in the past. It’s possible that Pacquiao struggled because of ring rust or a lack of motivation. After all, Vargas had recently beaten easily beaten by Tim Bradley a year before.

Pacquiao, 38, is supposed to beat Horn with flying colors, but anything is possible in this fight. Horn is 2012 Olympic with decent size, power, and boxing skills. Horn is fighting at home in front of his own fans. Like a lot of people, Pacquiao had never heard of Horn before his promoter Bob Arum decided to make this fight. Without a lot to go buy, Pacquiao is going to have to figure out Horn’s style and adapt as the fight progresses.

Pacquiao will need to be careful because Horn has shown in the past that he’s got some pop in his punches. He’s capable of knocking out Pacquiao if he lands enough of his big shots. Horn is coming into the Pacquiao fight on Saturday with a 3-fight consecutive streak in stopping Ali Funeka, Rico Mueller and Randall Bailey. Those are guys that have good chins, and Horn could take all three of them out with big shots. That’s impressive. It shows that Horn is for real.

This is a sink or swim fight for Pacquiao. He’s got the Mayweather fight that he wants, but his career is also on the line. Pacquiao losing to Jeff Horn would be a strong signal to him that he needs to retire from boxing. Pacquiao isn’t going to move down to 140 or 135 to try and breathe new life in his career, as there are no name fighters in those divisions. The money fights are at welterweight.

“I am looking for a big win here,” Roach said about Pacquiao. “We want to go on to bigger and better things.”

A win for Pacquiao keeps him alive in the Mayweather chase. A loss would be a pretty good indication that it’s time to hang up the gloves for the Filipino star. If Pacquiao wants to keep fighting to squeeze in a few more paydays, he can probably do that, but it might require for him to become a stepping stone for his promoter Bob Arum’s Top Rank fighters Terence Crawford and Vasyl Lomachenko.

That would be a sad ending for Pacquiao to wind up as someone that is being used as a stepping stone to increase the value of Top Rank guys. Hopefully, Pacquiao looks great in beating Horn, and then moves on to bigger and better things like a rematch with Mayweather. A story book ending for Pacquiao’s career would be for him to avenge his loss to Mayweather and show that his shoulder injury was the reason he lost his previous fight with him in 2015.

Mayweather needs to give Pacquiao a chance for a second fight. Pacquiao should make the first move to make the Mayweather rematch happen by contacting him directly, I wouldn’t leave it up to Arum to make the fight happen, because I don’t think it ever will without Pacquiao’s direct involvement.