Confident ‘Prince’

There was no trace of doubt on the face of IBF intercontinental super bantamweight champion “Prince” Albert Pagara when the Inquirer asked him to assess his Mexican opponent, Rodolfo “Fofo” Hernandez in Pinoy Pride 30 “D-Day: Donnie and Donaire” to be staged at Smart Araneta Coliseum on March 28.

“Hernandez has 24 knockout wins, I have only 15,” said the still-undefeated ALA boxer who has only 22 fights.

“Lamang siya ng nine knockouts (he has nine more kockouts),” said Pagara, who is from Maasin, Leyte.

Pagara said he has seen Hernandez fight on video, and he is unfazed. “Kaya (I can beat him)!” he said of the Mexican, who has won 26 matches, lost five bouts and has one draw.

Pagara and Hernandez will be vying for the IBF intercontinental junior featherweight belt. He predicts that this fight will end in a knockout.

“If I pass this test, Mr. (Michael) Aldeguer will send me to the United States to train. The boss has opened an ALA Gym in Los Angeles,” said the 21-year-old Pagara, who hopes to fight two-time Olympic gold medalist Guillermo Rigondeaux.

Nonito Donaire, Jr., the five-division world champion, will be the big attraction of the March 28 card, although his fight with William Prado of Brazil is not the main event.

Donaire and just about everybody in his team looks to this fight as a redemption match for the Fil-Am who got battered in his last fight by Jamaican Nicholas Walters, falling in the sixth round.

Donaire can hardly wait to climb the  ring to show everyone that he still has what it takes to pursue a glorious boxing career.

He is patient and has made a solemn vow to listen to his trainers and managers—which goes without saying that he probably didn’t listen to them in his fight with Walters.

In Donaire’s comeback, he will face a younger opponent with 22 wins, 15 by knockout, four losses and 1 draw.

Prado doesn’t look like a tough opponent but I guess Donaire’s advisers want him to take it slow but sure. The two will be fighting for the WBC North America Boxing Federation super bantamweight championship.

According to a well-known boxing scribe, the opponents of Pagara and two-time world boxing champion Donnie “Ahas” Nietes should prove much tougher.

Nietes, the longest-reigning Filipino world boxing champion, will clash with Mexican Gilberto “Parrito” Parra, another knockout specialist. Seventeen of Parra’s 19 wins were by KO.