Manny Pacquiao’s 12-round knockout of MIguel Cotto was barely over before talk of another glamorous matchup with the Filipino star began.
It may never happen, but a pairing of Pacquiao and Floyd Mayweather Jr. dominated talk in boxing circles.
It was even prevalent among some of the fans Saturday at the MGM Grand in Las Vegas who were chanting, “We want Floyd. We want Floyd.”
Pacquiao’s trainer, Freddie Roach, has the same sentiments.
“I want to see him fight Mayweather,” Roach said.
Pacquiao promoter Bob Arum said he was ready to begin negotiations with Mayweather’s promoter on a fight, while Mayweather issued a statement this week saying he wanted to hear from Pacquiao himself that he really wants the fight.
“Tell Manny Pacquiao to be his own man and stop letting everyone, including his loudmouth trainer, talk for him,” Mayweather said. “I am my own boss, speak for myself and tell it like it is. If Manny Pacquiao wants to fight me, all he has to do is step up to the plate and say it himself.”
Mayweather may have second thoughts after Pacquiao did what no fighter has done before — win a belt in a seventh weight class. More impressive, though, is how he has fought, dismantling opponents despite moving up consistently from 106 pounds to the 144 he weighed for the fight.
After taking the WBO version of the welterweight belt from Cotto, Pacquiao indicated he won’t trying any more weight classes.
“This is the last weight division for me,” Pacquiao said. “It’s history for me and more importantly a Filipino did it.”
Pacquiao used his blazing speed and power from both hands to win his seventh title in seven weight classes and cement his stature as the best pound-for-pound fighter in the world. Cotto took such a beating that his face was a river of red from the fury of Pacquiao’s punches, but he refused to quit even as his corner tried to throw in the towel after the 11th round.
“I didn’t know from where the punches were coming,” Cotto said.
The fight was billed as a 145-pound classic, and in the early rounds it didn’t disappoint. The two went after each other with a vengeance and Cotto more than held his own as they traded punches in the center of the ring before a roaring sellout crowd at the MGM Grand arena.
Pacquiao dropped Cotto with a right hand early in the third round, but he wasn’t badly hurt and came back to finish the round strong. But after Pacquiao put Cotto on the canvas with a big left hand late in the fourth round, the Puerto Rican was never the same again.
Cotto won two rounds on the scorecards of two ringside judges and just one round on the card of the third.
“Our plan was not to hurry, but to take our time,” Pacquiao said. “It was a hard fight and I needed time to test his power.”
Cotto’s face was marked early and he was bleeding midway through the fight as Pacquiao kept bouncing around and throwing punches in his unorthodox southpaw style. He tried to keep taking the fight to Pacquiao, but by then his punches had lost their sting and his only real chance was to land a big punch from nowhere.
“He hit harder than we expected and he was a lot stronger than we expected,” Cotto’s trainer, Joe Santiago, said.
Cotto fought gamely, but in the later rounds he was just trying to survive as blood flowed down his face and Pacquiao came after him relentlessly. Santiago tried to stop the fight after the 11th round, but Cotto went back out to take even more punishment before a final flurry along the ropes prompted referee Kenny Bayless to end it.
Cotto’s wife and child, who were at ringside, left after the ninth round, unable to watch the beating any longer. They later accompanied him to a local hospital for a post-fight examination.
“My health comes first. I just want to make sure I’m fine, but I feel great. I’m swollen but that’s all,” Cotto said.
His face swollen, Cotto was bleeding from his nose and his cuts, and he simply couldn’t stop Pacquiao from bouncing inside and throwing both hands at will.
“Manny Pacquiao is one of the best boxers I ever fought,” Cotto said.
Source: wavenewspapers.com
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