Here
are some of the emails I received in the past day or so in the aftermath of the
bout between Manny Pacquiao and Juan Manuel Marquez:
“Steve, not sure what all the fuss is
about. I flew in from the great state of AK to watch pac/marq fight, had
great seats, and thought it was a great show. I suspect you let the
overwhelming Mexican/Spanish crowd sway you. You were there, it was easily
filled with 50+% mexicans. These were the only ones I seen upset.
Had it been the same crowd that attended the cotto fight, and were even on
supporters of pacman and his opponent there wouldn't be much fuss. Much
like all 3 fights, it was close. Fight could have gone either way,
depending on what you look for. It was clear to me that Marquez had the
cleaner looking shots. However PAC had volume, and made the fight.
Without PAC making fight, Marquez does nothing. I'm biased towards
pacman, and was nervous b4 cards were read; but after watching it again I like
the decision.
You want boxing to go mainstream, quit rewarding fighters for never pressing
action, and pot shotting. You complain about mayweather being boring, but
score this one for Marquez, despite him fighting like maywether. That was
his plan. This wasn't the same action fighter we seen against the baby
bull or katsidis. He had a plan to pot shoot, and not get knocked out;
which took from what could have been a great fight. It's any wonder UFC
has a following. Not saying Marquez is boring, far from it, but on this
night his game plan looked just like maywether (who's all excitement till he
gets in the ring)
Thank you,
Lonnie Guthrie”
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“I don’t know, Steve. It seems that
every time Manny gets beat by Marquez, the Pacquiao camp comes up with excuses.
In other fights I’ve heard them blame their performance on Manny’s long hair,
socks, blisters, gloves and so on. This was supposed to be the new and improved
Pacquiao. The best Pacquiao ever to set foot in the ring. Now he’s distracted.
Now his foot cramps up. He is supposed to be a professional. Never does he
complain about his feet or socks when he blows out those weight drained, half
dead flat-footed mummies.
After his second bout with The Hitman,
Sugar Ray has said numerous times that Tommy won that fight. I can see it in
Leonard’s face that it was difficult to admit defeat, but he did and my respect
for the man went through the roof. My point is, when you get in the ring you
know when you’ve been beaten and you know when you are the winner. The body
language told the story on Saturday.
I love this sport, but it’s hard to
defend it when these things happen over and over. I haven’t ordered a PPV fight
in 2 years because I’m losing respect for the sport. Still, I can’t leave it
completely. I grew up with it.
Can you imagine if Holyfield admitted
his loss to Lewis or if Chavez would admit that Whitaker was the better man
that night? The sport would have taken a turn for the better. Right now we
could be talking about an epic victory. One of those once in a lifetime upsets.
Instead we’re talking about another bad decision.
Boxing fans are some of the most
knowledgeable fans on the planet. And no amount of bias commentary from HBO (or
compubox numbers) will fool us.
Not the worst decision I’ve seen, but it
was bad. On par with De La Hoya – Sturm. And whether you had it close or not, I
believe the winner was pretty clear
In my humble opinion, I marked it down 8
rounds to 4 for JMM. Thanks to Marquez for a spectacular display of
counter-punching, defense and grit.
AT”
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“Hello, I cant believe the reaction to the
decision in this fight. Come on it was close but no way was it a bad decision
or robbery. Bottom line is Marquez never tried to impose himself on
Pacman or try go for a KO or as the saying goes take the title. . Everyone has
an off night. No big deal. Pacquaio won the fight close from a good
countpuncher who makes most everyone look bad. Also this is another case
of where a 15 round fight would have had a conclusive ending one way or
another. I gave up about 2 years ago waiting for the Mayweather -
Pacman fight to happen. It wont , lets simply move on and enjoy
watching the few good matchups that happen and stop this waiting game for a
fight that wont happen because of Mayweathers whatever, I dont even care anymore.
Kurt
Kurt Noltimier”
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“Well, I guess I’ll be boycotting Pac V.
Floyd. The only way a fight fan can “make a statement” is with his money,
and so I won’t be shelling it out for the fight.
First off, Marquez won. I had him
8-4 (can’t remember which rounds, as I crumpled my paper and chucked it when
the scores were announced). I thought he just landed the cleaner shots,
and were simply more effective shots. They’d each throw and Marquez would
land the shot that knocked Pacquiao back. I never thought I would have
seen it. Infact, I had bed on Pac to win via KO. But, in no way did
Pacquiao win that fight.
Here’s what bothers me about the
judges. They are picked by the Promoter, and sanctioned by the
commission. So if you know who butters your bread, you sure as f**k won’t
be the one that makes him miss out on a possible $50M payday of a fight.
Makes me sick.
I’ve followed boxing for a while.
Easy 15 years (yes that’s not too long, but you get me). I have HBO and
Showtime for the boxing. I watch all undercards, and even the stinker
fights. I love boxing. But stuff like this…it taints it for
me. And decisions like this WILL be an issue that boxing will have and
loose more and more of its fan base.
Lastly, if everyone thought Marquez was
a good counter puncher, wait till Manny gets a load of Floyd. If that
version of Manny shows up, shoot even a little bit better version, Floyd has
his way with him and puts a beating on him.
Matthew Culley”
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“Marquez came in a 9-1 undertiger. He
put up a far better fight than people could imagine. Now the thought process
becomes such that every close round (they all were) one tends to give the
undertiger.
This is one psychological factor.
Besides it was clear to my eyes that Pac Man had the better ring-generalship.
He took the fight in any direction he wanted. 90% of the fight Pacquaio moved
forward NOT Marquez. Finally the Compu Punch showed Pacquaio landed MORE punches
than Marquez.
It was one of the most difficult fight
to decide in any definitive manner, but taking all of the above I give the nod
to Pacquaio.
Keep punching
Enver Khorasanee”
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OK,
so now I'm confused. Was this a close fight where Marquez was robbed or a
robbery that was a close fight? But seriously, I do want to see this fight
again and see how I judge it the second time around (For the record, I had
Marquez winning 115-113 from ringside on Saturday night).
This much is clear; this is one of the more debated verdicts in recent memory,
if not one of the more controversial.
COACH K FLURRIES
Eddie Gomez and Antonio Infante face each other on this week’s edition of “Solo
Boxeo” on Telefutura from Puerto Rico… On Boxeo Azteca on Azteca America, Chris
Algieri takes on Bayan Jargal at the Paramount Theater in Huntington, New
York...On Dec. 17th in Quebec City, Antonin Decarie and Victor Lupo mix
it up for the vacant WBC international welterweight championship at the Pepsi
Coliseum. Folks, it doesn't get any bigger than to fight for the WBC
international title...I'm told that unlike the Mayweather-Ortiz replay, there
will be no bonus “24/7” footage on the replay for Pacquiao-Marquez III, which
is a bit of a buzzkill. I really enjoyed how HBO did that...Seriously, is “Coach
K” Mike Krzyzewski the greatest college basketball coach ever? Yeah, the great John Wooden won
many more titles, but it was a much different era. To have the sustained
success of Duke over all these years is
remarkable...Not unlike Aaron Rodgers, “Pan Am” just keeps getting better and
better...If all the cocaine seized is really Ivan Calderon's (and I'm hoping
it's not) all I can say is that I always thought of him as a runner but, geez,
never to this degree...
