MANNY PACQUIAO, the best fighter in the world, will win his match against Shane Mosley this Sunday. I’m not really going out on a limb with my prediction; at 39, Sugar Shane is past his prime, and in fact hasn’t been impressive in the last 22 or so rounds he has fought against Floyd Mayweather and Sergio Mora. The last time Mosley showed signs of being the dangerous fighter he was for most of his career, he was pounding Antonio Margarito from pillar to post a few minutes after Naazim Richardson, Sugar Shane’s trainer, complained about the Mexican fighter’s hands being wrapped by a hardening substance in the locker room. That was two years ago.

But even though Mosley doesn’t really stand much of a chance, it’s unclear that anyone in this weight class not named Floyd Mayweather really does against Pacquiao. At this point in the Sarangani congressman’s boxing career, any opponent would have to have the performance of his life to beat the Pac-Man, and even then, that effort might not be enough to topple the pound-for-pound king (see Cotto, Miguel; Marquez, Juan Manuel).

So while the match-up between Pacquiao and Mosley doesn’t really capture the imagination of boxing diehards, it’s hard to find a better opponent from a business point of view. Andre Berto, a name that had previously floated as a potential opponent, doesn’t have the brand name recognition of Mosley, and after his loss to Victor Ortiz, it’s not clear how much more competitive he would have been against Pacquiao. A Marquez fight is intriguing – it’s already been lined up, according to reports – but it’s been three years since his second fight with Pacquiao, who’s no longer the same fighter; experts agree that a fight at 147 pounds would be a mismatch for Marquez, who seems at his best at 135 pounds. Mayweather, meanwhile, is still busy rehabbing his vagina.

The Pacquiao camp has gotten a bit of backlash, mostly from hardcore boxing fans, that they had been handpicking opponents that the boxer can beat handily, and there is some merit to that argument. Then again, that practice has been in effect almost as long as combat sports has been in existence.

Mike Tyson shot down tomato cans on his way to being the baddest man in the planet, and beat down a washed-up Larry Holmes to cement his hold on the undisputed heavyweight championship of the world. The legendary Joe Louis fought a string of lightly-regarded boxers that were nicknamed the “Bum of the Month Club”; while some people resented the nickname because its members were top ten fighters, it was clear that Louis was in a class of his own.

Mickey did the same thing for Rocky Balboa after the fighter won the heavyweight title from Apollo Creed, lining up jobbers for the Italian Stallion’s title defenses, as revealed in “Rocky III” to Balboa’s surprise. Some Roman emperors joined the arena as gladiators, and were matched up against poorly-equipped or poorly-trained opponents who had no chance of beating them; one emperor, Claudius, even fought a beached whale in front of spectators to prove his might.

Pacquiao versus Mosley may be a mismatch, but it’s not so bad considering the history of boxing (real or fictional) or all of combat sports for that matter. Because while Sugar Shane may be old, he’s no beached whale. And he’s got a better nickname too.



FORTUNATELY FOR PACQUIAO, hardcore fans’ lack of thrill toward the Mosley fight seems to have escaped the Filipino boxing faithful. Last night, when I went to the cinema to get pay-per-view tickets for me and my buddies – a tradition that’s been going on for several years now – I found that most of the theaters were almost sold out. Because I had waited until Thursday to purchase the tickets, we had to settle for seats three rows away from the front of the screen. And this is with virtually every theater and bar offering live viewing packages, not to mention politicians sponsoring viewing events across the country.

To be sure, a big part of why my friends and I pony up hundreds of pesos to watch live a match that we feel might be a mismatch is because we enjoy watching Pacquiao together. It was something we started doing in college, when he was still this skinny fighter with frosted tips that made him look like a dipshit. Over the years, my friends and I have grown to have less in common with each other, brought about by having much less time to hang out because of all that grown-up crap we end up having to deal with – work, marriage, children, picking fights with sports officials and members of the literati, etc. So Pacquiao remains one of the few things for which we still have a common affinity, for which we still carve out the time.

In a way, we – and I suppose, the rest of Pacquiao’s Philippine fandom – are in it less for the competition than we are for his performance. It’s more akin to watching a slam dunk contest than a boxing match; we couldn’t care less about the other guy, we just want Pacquiao to climb higher, do something more ridiculous than the last time we saw him, wow us once again.

FEW EVENTS IN BOXING – and really, in all of sports – compare to the experience of watching Pacquiao fight. At his very best, and sometimes, even when he’s holding back, Pacquiao’s whirling dervish performances inside the ring provide an experience so visceral that it moves every bit of your soul. You know how people talk about wanting to gun their cars after coming out of watching those Fast and Furious movies? Pacquiao makes people want to run out and punch someone in the face, and I mean that in the least hostile, sociopathic way possible.

Pacquiao’s promoter, Bob Arum of Top Rank Boxing, has seized on this over the past few years as he steadily positioned the Pinoy champ as the face of the sport. For the most part, he has succeeded; Pacquiao is to boxing what Roger Federer and Tiger Woods are to tennis and golf, respectively. That he isn’t as popular as the other men has less to do with Pacquiao, and more to do with boxing’s savage reputation compared to those other sports.

Top Rank has done a good job pushing Pacquiao, although I could probably use less of that patronizing tone – “Look at him, so humble and innocent, fighting for his countrymen” – but then again that marketing style isn’t exclusive to boxing.

The boxing promotion is making its big play with the Pacquiao-Mosley fight, working with the ultimate goal of bringing the sport back to American free television. Using Pacquiao as its trump card, Top Rank signed a deal with Showtime, which is owned by the same media conglomerate as top-rating channel CBS. The network giant says that if the Pacquiao-Mosley fight does well, CBS just might have boxing back in its schedule – an opportunity to reacquaint the sport to a wider American audience. Pacquiao, just by virtue of being Pacquiao, just might save the future of boxing.



OF COURSE, what could potentially happen in the United States has already happened on these shores. While boxing has always been on Philippine network television, it wasn’t until Pacquiao blew up that the top two channels started investing heavily in the sport. Suddenly, everyone wanted a piece of him.

But the biggest boon for the sport might have been the way his success has opened the floodgates of opportunities for Filipino boxers. Before Pacquiao, great Filipino champions like Luisito Espinosa and Gerry Penalosa had trouble finding lucrative paydates in the United States; Espinosa kept getting screwed by promoters, while Penalosa had to fight a bunch of matches in Seoul, South Korea – the hometown decision capital of the world – just to get a big payday.

It remains to be seen if the country’s boxing community can continue to take advantage, but the key is that while Pacquiao is fighting, the door remains open for any talented Filipino boxer to make a name – and a living – for himself in the United States.

So Manny Pacquiao fighting Shane Mosley, in what appears to be a mismatch, is a small price to pay for the visceral thrill it provides the Filipino fanbase, the potential salvation of boxing, and the continuation of the opportunities for other Pinoy boxers to make it big. Not to mention that he’ll be wearing yellow gloves to generate interest about poverty in the Philippines. I’ll even forgive the fact that the cool $20 million he receives will probably go to binge gambling sessions at cock derbies or to bankroll his next election campaign.

When Pacquiao wins – at least in boxing – we all win.