Pacquiao by KO—Roach

Manny Pacquiao poses with his coach Teddy Roach (L) on April 20 in Hollywood, California. AFP

Declaring Manny “Pacman” Pacquiao tip-top shape, trainer Freddie Roach said on Wednesday his prized Filipino fighter could be the first to knockout former five-time world champ “Sugar” Shane Mosley in the big-money fight on May 7 at the MGM Grand Arena in Las Vegas.

“We’re 100 percent ready for the fight. If Mosley brings his best we’re ready for his best. I don’t think there is any room for an upset,” Roach said during an international conference call.

Roach said Mosley’s attacking game is perfect for Pacquiao’s “aggressive style,” and confidently predicted that Pacman would win by knockout.

“I think all fights should end in knockouts so I’m looking for a knockout,” said Roach, a five-time Trainer of the Year awardee of the Boxing Writers Association of America.

Roach said he has prepared Pacquiao to deal with the best that Mosley brings to the ring, which is against come-forward foes who love to trade punches, like Antonio Margarito and Ricardo Mayorga who both ended up being stopped by Mosley in the late rounds.

“In the Margarito fight [Mosley] looked great and Margarito has an aggressive style like Manny and that’s how we’ll attack him,” Roach said. “It will be a little more scientific, of course, but we’re ready for the best Shane Mosley out there.

But Pacquiao downplayed the knockout angle, insisting that Mosley at 39 “is still very strong and moves like he’s 30 years old.”

“We’re not focused for the knockout. All we do is work hard and if the knockout comes, it comes. We’ve prepared ourselves for fighting 12 rounds,” said Pacquiao, the reigning best fighter in the world pound-for-pound.

“If the knockouts come, they come. What matters is the fight that we can give to the people and the fans. I want them to be happy and excited about our performance,” said Pacquiao who has a guaranteed purse of $20 million against Mosley’s $5 million in the sold-out fight.

Hall of Fame promoter Bob Arum of Top Rank assured that including their share of pay-per-view revenues, both Pacquiao and Mosley will be making “record paydays” in the Showtime-televised pay-per-view fight.

He said he considers the May 7 defense of his World Boxing Organization welterweight title “bigger” than his most recent fight against Margarito because Mosley “moves fast and he has good speed and power.”

“That’s what I want. He throws a lot of punches. It will be good for us and it will be a good fight,” added Pacquiao, the only fighter to win a record eight world titles in as many weight divisions.

Showing tremendous respect for his African American foe, Pacquiao described Mosley, a former pound-for-pound champ in his prime, as “a good fighter and a comeback fighter also. He was referring to Mosley stunning KO wins over Margarito and Mayorga when he was all but written off as by some boxing experts.

Mosley, who remains an 8-1 underdog by Las Vegas odd makers, said the underdog tag only motivates him even more “to shock the world” and beat Pacquiao decisively.

Mosley thinks he could hurt Pacquiao with some well-timed power shots when they trade punches in the middle of the ring.

“If Margarito, who is slow, could hit him with so many shots, think how I much more I could hit him,” Mosley said. “Styles make fights, and I think I have what it takes to beat Pacquiao.

Mosley, who has a higher knockout rate than Pacquiao, then went on to predict he would stop Pacquiao “by the seventh round.”

Mosley’s trainer Naazim Richardson, however, has a more realistic and strategic approach to the Pacquiao fight.

Conceding that Pacquiao is the best fighter of his era, Richardson thinks he has the antidote to Pacquiao’s vaunted speed and explosiveness: exploit his flaws, which are few.

“This is a marathon, it’s not a sprint. It doesn’t matter who runs the fastest. In the end, it’s only who finishes up the proper way [who wins],” he said in the last episode of Camp 360 aired by CBS and Showtime.

Richardson told Yahoo Sports’ Kevin Iole that Mosley — a champion in three weight classes — has the pedigree, the ability, the dedication and intelligence to beat anyone, including Pacquiao.

“Believe me, we understand that Pacquiao is a problem. He’s got a crazy amount of energy… The only attribute in boxing Manny Pacquiao doesn’t have is height and range,” Richardson.

He then rattled off Pacman’s attributes: ring generalship, movement, speed, power, one-punch power, and combination punching.

“He has everything except height and range,” Richardson observed.

And the highly respected ring strategist thinks he has come up with a game plan to deal with a “problem” like Pacquiao.

“I agree that Pacquiao is a problem. He’s a special guy. We respect him tremendously. But you know what? We’re going to show up and we believe we can do it,” Richardson said.

Fight analysis

Aware that the early rounds would be crucial, Pacquiao is expected to box and move a lot in the first four or five rounds, in much the same way when he fought Oscar De La Hoya in that career-defining victory in December 2009.

Expect Pacquiao to set a frenetic pace of moving in to throw punches in bunches and in angles and then withdrawing to stay out of Mosley power.

In contrast, Mosley will be looking to hurt Pacquiao in the early going for a possible upset. There will be furious exchanges between these two attack-minded protagonists.

At his age, Mosley is not as sharp and as quick as he was five year ago. He last two fights — a lopsided decision loss to Floyd Mayweather Jr and a lackluster majority draw with light-punching Sergio Mora — showed this once-elite champion is past his prime.

Can Mosley, who is known to have a solid chin and has not been seriously hurt even by bigger foes, summon the speed, power and ring savvy to upset the fastest and most explosive opponent he has ever fought in Pacquiao? At his best, Mosley out-boxed a prime De La Hoya twice, knocked out Fernando Vargas twice and held his own against bigger middleweight champ Winky Wright and the late welterweight star Vernon Forrest.

In contrast, Pacquiao has demonstrated a remarkable ability to stop bigger opponents, like Ricky Hatton, De La Hoya, and Miguel Cotto as he went up in weight. He has also taken the best shots of these and other foes despite the obvious size disadvantage.

Pacquiao, whose legacy as an all-time great boxer is fairly secured, is looking for a dramatic win over Mosley. As articulated by his trainer Roach, Pacman is looking to be the first to stop the durable Mosley. That way, he would prove to the world beyond any shadow of doubt that he is the greatest fighter of his era.

“I want Manny to make a statement in this fight,” Roach told newsmen at a recent interview. I want Manny to be the first to knock out Mosley.

Some pundits speculate that a resounding victory by Pacquiao could force Mayweather to finally fight Pacman out of sheer pride. And even if that mega fight does not happen, the Filipino icon would have silenced the trash-taking Mayweather that he is the best fighter of his era, a recognition Floyd claims belong to him.

I see Pacquiao winning by technical knockout in the late rounds. If the fight goes the distance, it will still be a near-shutout for Pacman—in the same fashion he beat Margarito and the defense-minded Joshua Clottey. FilAm Star