Amidst recent developments in the Philippines, will Manny Pacquiao continue to fight after June 9th? Peter Quillin has been hoping for a big fight sooner than later, so why is he taking a fight with retired-but-not former champion Ronald “Winky” Wright? Does a second win over Amir Khan greatly intensify Lamont Peterson’s chance to fight Floyd Mayweather in the future? Find out the answer to these questions and more in this week’s “From Pillar to Post!”
No Bluffing Here, Pacquiao May Seriously Retire
Ever since his “vision from the heavens” appeared to him a few months ago, Manny Pacquiao is cleaning house with all of the ungodly temptations in his life. He has closed his hotel where he would normally go to drink, gamble, and pick up on whatever pretty women he wanted. Instead, he’s taking up more Sunday School classes at church and wants to become an ambassador for the bible. Sensing his best money-making days are now behind him and his career is coming to an end, Manny has gone the M.C. Hammer route and is turning to God.
Pacquiao has since maintained that he’d definitely retire as he pursues a gubernatorial seat in the Sarangani province, but at the behest of his mother and wife, and the divine intervention, it looks like Pacquiao is ready to call it a day and turn his time to the people of the Philippines. With the Timothy Bradley fight approaching on June 9th, trainers Freddie Roach and Alex Ariza seem concerned about his motivation for such a low-key opponent in Bradley, who brings a larger risk and much lower net profits than his previous opponents.
Then again, this is still the same Manny Pacquiao who accepted a suitcase full of cash and a steak dinner from Oscar De La Hoya to fight for Golden Boy while still under contract to Top Rank. He’s also the same Pacquiao who subsequently threatened to torpedo his fights with De La Hoya and Ricky Hatton if he wasn’t going to get paid more money, not to mention also pulling the retirement card when faced with high risk/low reward opponent Joshua Clottey in 2010. Time will tell if this is just another ploy for Pacquiao to make a quick buck before cashing out, but I feel personally that Pacquiao may be seriously contemplating retirement instead of fighting at all.
“Winky” Fight All Wrong for Quillin
Golden Boy Promotions seems to be content in providing, in my opinion, an awful undercard to support Miguel Cotto/Floyd Mayweather on May 5th, as they’ve announced another support bout pitting their rising Middleweight prospect “Kid Chocolate” Peter Quillin against former Jr. Middleweight champion Ronald “Winky” Wright, who has fought twice in four years and hasn’t won a fight in five. No disrespect to Wright, who has had a fine career and was a good champion in his day, but he doesn’t belong on the biggest event of the year, especially when neither HBO nor Showtime has wanted to have him on their regular networks. Wright has already served his purpose in the boxing order in ceding to the younger generation when he was dominated by Paul Williams in his last fight two years ago. While Wright deserves to fight on if he chooses, it just doesn’t make sense to have him on such a big card.
Quillin stands the most to lose out of all of this because simply dominating an inactive and old Wright isn’t going to raise his stock. Stopping him might, but that will be minimized due to the chronic inactivity I pointed out earlier. I don’t think Quillin is too far out from a title shot. He’s a good looking fighter and has talent no doubt, but he lacks exposure, so putting him on the undercard against a guy he probably can’t stop and will absolutely make him look awful is extremely counter-productive. Seeing that this is a Cinco de Mayo card, why not match up Quillin with the red hot Delvin Rodriguez right now? That’d be a much more entertaining fight for the promotion and a better gauge of talent than Wright.
Will Lamont Peterson Find Himself on the Short List for “Money” Mayweather?
I have to applaud Amir Khan for putting his bottle away, wiping his nose, and deciding the best way to get revenge on Lamont Peterson will be to fight him in the ring, not in arbitration. Peterson/Khan II will take place May 19th at the Mandalay Bay in Las Vegas, with the excellent co-feature of Lucas Matthysse/Humberto Soto. Both fights scream Fight of the Year all over them and I love it. Peterson certainly fought from the edge of obscurity last year en route to his close decision win over Khan last December. It’s not out of the question to say that if Peterson beats Khan again, which I believe he will, then Peterson might be on the list to fight Mayweather somewhere down the line.
Khan is a huge ratings driver on HBO. The first Peterson fight was one of the most watched broadcasts of last year, so the rematch will no doubt be heavily covered by casual and hardcore fans alike. Being that Khan was oh-so-close to fighting Mayweather prior to the Peterson loss, it’s safe to say that Peterson may inherit the spoils by beating Khan cleanly. By putting him in the rear view mirror, he can find himself bigger paydays. May 19th will be a pretty important night of boxing in the long run, so that’s another reason you’ll have no excuse to miss what will already be a tremendous night of action.
Before I head out this week, make sure you visit my buddies over at www.boxingduringdinner.com and check out episode 41 where yours truly makes a stop to talk about this weekend’s fights.
