The latest on Manny Pacquiao says the legendary eight-division world champion was the least impressed with the punching power of Errol Spence, who on Sunday made a trouble-free jump up the world pound-for-pound ladder with a masterful conquest of the overrated Mikey Garcia in Arlington, Texas.
Veteran sportswriter Nick Giongco, who was also at ringside for the Spence-Garcia bout, said Pacquiao told him Spence was something of a petty puncher.
“He was drooling over the idea of fighting Spence next,” Giongco reported.
Giongco said Pacquiao likened Spence to Lehlo Ledwabah, defending South African world super bantamweight champion—“Hindi naman masyadong malakas”—whom Pacquiao annihilated in his US debut in 2001.
The verdict (on Spence) could come as a surprise to those who felt Pacquiao did not sound too enthusiastic, after he flatly retorted “Why not?” to Spence’s open dare on top of the ring in Arlington.
Many observers could find the five-foot-ten Spence too big and powerful for Pacquiao.
Truth is trainer Freddie Roach had announced his choice of Spence for Pacquiao’s next opponent days before last Sunday’s title fight in Texas.
“I’d love for Manny to fight the winner. What a fight that will be,” Roach declared.
Roach would most likely push harder for Pacquiao to pursue a meeting with Spence who, this early, is being celebrated as the best welterweight boxer by his handlers.
There are more than enough fans to dispute that contention, and go for the unbeaten Terence Crawford of Omaha, the WBO welterweight king.
For the record, Roach, while still the Pacquiao full-time trainer, dissuaded Pacquiao from trying to do it with Crawford, saying the sensational American warrior was “young, too big, and strong.”
Didn’t Roach find Spence bigger and stronger than Crawford?
There might be something Roach had seen which might have escaped Team Pacquiao.
Spence, 29, is the IBF 147-lb champion, while Pacquiao, 40, owns the WBA regular welterweight title.