DALLAS – Manny Pacquiao doesn’t have much to say. Joshua Clottey probably says less than Pacquiao. The thing that spoke the loudest at the final news conference for their fight on Saturday was the venue, Cowboys Stadium in Arlington, Texas.
As you approach it by car, watching it get bigger and bigger and bigger than you ever imagined as you get closer, your mouth falls open. And the striking ultra-modern design adds a futuristic element that screams out “cutting edge.” To me, an Angeleno, it was Staples Center on an overdose of steroids.
Then you walk inside and see the cavernous space, brightly lit through the glass roof, and the legendary high-definition JumboTron and you can’t help but think, “Wow!” The screen is 53 yards wide, or more than half the football field on which the Cowboys play, reportedly the biggest in the world.
They say everything is big in Texas … but this is ridiculous. The fighters on the screen will be more than 10 times bigger than the genuine articles.
“When these fighters are punching each other, when these guys are sweating and strategizing in the middle of the ring, they’ll be 72-feet tall … just like our Cowboys players,” said Cowboys and stadium owner Jerry Jones, who obviously is tickled to have a fight card at his $1.2 billion playground.
This isn’t the first non-NFL event at the stadium. The NBA staged its all-star game on Feb. 14 before a mind-boggling 108,713 spectators.
Jones said it was an amazing night, even better than he imagined. A relatively sparse 45,000 are expected to attend the fight card on Saturday but Jones, as positive as any person you’ll meet, believes it will be just as exciting as the basketball event.
“This has a very similar feel to the all-star game,” said Jones, referring to the lead-up to the fight. “First of all, it’s exciting. It’s fun. It’s fun to have you curious about it, the media. That’s important for the stadium. The goal is for the stadium to be recognized all over the country and internationally as a place that’s important. You put someone like Manny Pacquiao in a venue and you accomplish that.
“I think I have a sense of what it’ll be like (on Saturday). I thought I did for the all-star game and the atmosphere, the energy was even better than I thought. I think the energy will be even better for this.”
Jones didn’t want to discuss the future of boxing at the stadium in detail but made it clear that this won’t be the last card in Arlington.
“I think you’ll see that these new stadiums can’t survive on only their main attraction,” said Carl Moretti, vice president of boxing operations for Top Rank. “Especially football stadiums, where they have eight games a year, a couple of exhibitions and hope to get into the playoffs. They need other events to fill them.
“… And there were a thousand reasons to have the fight here – Jerry Jones, the TV screen, the history in this market, just the stadium itself. It clearly is the greatest stadium in the world right now.”
No one at the news conference would question that.
Weighty issues: Roach said Pacquiao weighed 144 pounds on Tuesday, three pounds under the 147-pound welterweight limit. However, the fighter will eat two meals before the weigh-in and will come in at 147 on the scale on Friday, Roach said. He’ll then weigh about 150 on fight night.
Cotto presumably also will make the 147-pound limit, his weight for most of his fights over the last 14 years. On fight night, he could be as heavy as 165, or 15 more than Pacquiao. There’s an even bigger gap in fighters’ natural walking-around weight, about 145 for Pacquiao and almost 170 for Clottey.
That might seem like a huge edge in Clottey’s favor but Roach thinks otherwise.
“If he comes in at 165, it’s too much,” he said. “It’ll slow him down. It has to.”
Clottey probably wouldn’t be fighting as a welterweight if he weren’t fighting Pacquiao. He can make 147 – or he wouldn’t have taken the fight – but he must work extremely hard and sacrifice to do it.
As a result, he said, his power has suffered. He no longer knocks out his opponents at the same rate he once did. He has 20 knockouts but only one in his last 10 fights, a fifth-round TKO over Jose Luis Cruz at the 154-pound limit in 2008.
“I feel I’m unstoppable (at 154),” Clottey said. “Against Jose Luis Cruiz, I was unstoppable. He couldn’t take my power.”
That doesn’t mean much for Saturday.
Dillusional? Clottey said he expects Pacquiao to throw about 1,000 punches over 12 rounds, if the fight lasts the long. And he believes that will be part of the Filipino’s undoing.
Clottey said all human beings have their limits, including his seemingly unbeatable opponent.
“Throwing a thousand punches and moving around like he does … he can’t do that for 12 rounds,” Clottey said. “He’s not a machine. He’ll definitely stay there at times. And when he stays there, that’s when I’ll land my punches.”
The obvious question is this: What makes Clottey believe Pacquiao isn’t a machine?
Source: ringtv.com
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