LAS VEGAS–Next time you’d ask for a prediction for a Manny Pacquiao fight, don’t go to his trainer Freddie Roach, his manager Gary Shaw or even the boxer’s closest friends.
Go to his wife, Jinkee, and chances are you’ll get a good one–a very good one, in fact.
Days before Pacquiao climbed the ring against Erik Morales, Jinkee issued her own pre-fight forecast that her husband would knock Morales out in the 10th round.
“Ten rounds. For me it’s 10 rounds,” Jinkee told The STAR inside the $4,000-a-month LA apartment which Pacquiao rents when he’s training in the US. Jinkee’s prediction, made over lunch as Pacquiao prepared to leave for Las Vegas, came true Saturday when Morales was knocked out the 10th round. It was the first time that the Mexican former three-time world champion was knocked out.
Roach had predicted a knockout win for Pacquiao, too, but couldn’t go farther and more specific as Jinkee. Shaw, the manager, said Pacquiao would win inside eight rounds.
Erik Pineda, Pacquiao’s marketing manager, said the Filipino southpaw would win inside six rounds. “I was wrong,” said Shaw, smiling, during the post-fight press conference.
They were all wrong. Except for Jinkee. “What did I tell you? Wasn’t I the only one who made the right guess?” Jinkee told The STAR after the fight.
“It won’t be the last time we’d ask you for a prediction,” she was told.
