WBO welterweight champion Jessie Vargas could increase his chance of pulling off an upset win if he decides to go toe-to-toe with Manny Pacquiao when they face each other in the ring on Nov. 5 at the Thomas & Mack Center in Las Vegas, Nevada.
Vargas is a good boxer but with Pacquiao’s awesome power, speed, experience and skill, he has a little or no chance at all of winning either on points or by knockout if Vargas deals with the eight-division world champion in a conventional way or by running around to avoid Pacquiao’s attack. Going toe-to-toe with Pacquiao increases Vargas’ chance of pulling off the upset as it will give both of them an equal chance of landing a knockout punch. Pacquiao’s boyhood friend and assistant trainer Buboy Fernandez believes Vargas will run the moment he feels Pacquiao’s punching power. For his part, Pacquiao’s strength and conditioning coach Justin Fortune believes the fighting senator is motivated for his upcoming fight as he earlier predicted that the fight won’t go the distance with Pacquiao winning by knockout. ?Manny was ridiculously fast and even on a bad day, looks good,? Fortune said as the camp prepares to move over to the Wild Card Gym in Hollywood in about a week for the final phase of Pacquiao’s training. Both Fortune and Pacquiao’s longtime trainer Freddie Roach do not share Fernandez’s prognosis about Vargas running around Pacquiao once he feels his power punches, saying Vargas ?who is a fighter won?t run and will stand and fight,? they said. Roach and Fortune is absolutely right when they said that Vargas will go for a toe-to-toe confrontation with Pacquiao as it is clearly his best option for a possible upset win. Obviously, Pacquiao may have already anticipated what Vargas will bring to the table on Nov. 5 and as everyone knows he would love the idea of confronting Vargas on a toe-to-toe situation.
