CARSON, California—After his title fight with Manny Pacquiao next month, Chris Algieri wants to play chess with the Filipino ring icon, too.
Algieri said his plan is to basically break Pacquiao’s rhythm and that his mental approach to the sport will help him a lot in his bid to wrest the WBO welterweight fight on Nov. 23 in Macau.
“Myself and my coaches put up a game plan and now we’re just trying to enact it and now things are going really really well,” said Algieri.
He gave the brief interview at the sidelines of the double world championship fight at StubHub here where Nicholas Walters humbled Nonito Donaire Jr. with a sixth-round knockout for the undisputed WBA featherweight crown, and Gennady Golovkin stopped Marco Antonio Rubio in the second for the IBF middleweight crown.
The highly partisan pro-Filipino crowd booed when Algieri was mentioned as among the audience.
Algieri, the 30-year-old who is undefeated in 21 fights, said Pacquiao is the gold standard in staccato style of boxing.
“He follows a rhythm, he throws punches and then move sideways. (I’ll win) if I could find a way to disrupt that rhythm, like the way (Juan Manuel) Marquez did.”
More than his height advantage—he’s easily three four inches taller—Algieri feels it’s his smarts that will be his main weapon.