A month after Manny Pacquiao?s demolition job of Oscar de la Hoya in Las Vegas on Dec. 6 last year, a number of questions about the physical condition of the Golden Boy remain unanswered. There is reason to believe that the questions are unanswered because they have become, so to speak, moot and academic, having been overtaken by the simple fact that Pacquiao emerged victorious in spectacular fashion.
People have a tendency to dismiss these unsettled queries by simply saying: ?Who cares? Manny won anyway and De la Hoya seems headed for the pasture.?
Still the questions remain and are being analyzed by keen boxing observers like Cesar Medina of Quezon City. In post Pacquiao-De la Hoya fight discussions with Medina and other aficionados, we continue to wonder why De la Hoya was 145 pounds during the official weigh-in the afternoon before the ?Dream Match? (while Pacquiao tipped the scales at 142 pounds at the official weigh in and was around 148.5 pounds just before the fight and therefore right within target of the Freddie Roach-mandated weight of 150 pounds on opening bell) and was 147 pounds just before the fight.
In short, Pacquiao was about 1.5 pounds heavier than De la Hoya when the two ring gladiators were atop the ring. If De la Hoya went on a rigorous diet regimen to go down from 160 – 165 pounds, his walking weight, he may not have re-hydrated properly since he gained only two pounds more than 24 hours after the diet program was supposed to have ended, which is after the official weigh-in. Either that, or to be malicious about the whole weigh-in proceedings, something may have been wrong with the scales.
This probable improper re-hydration is given more credence especially when veteran Angelo Dundee states words to the effect after the fight that De la Hoya was on a diet program and was not technically training for the Pacquiao fight. Roach also stated much earlier that De la Hoya ?trained to lose weight instead of training for the fight.? Dundee said that Foreman went through the same comeback route but had trained real hard for his comeback.
De la Hoya had therefore, even before the opening ball rang, lost his main advantage of size and strength because again, as Dundee and Roach pointed out, he looked flat and (his gas tank) empty as early as the first round.
In contrast, Pacquiao was in tremendous physical and psychological shape not having had to undergo an annoying weight reduction program. To be sure, Pacquiao has learned painful lessons about not being able to make the weight limit. In his second defense of the World Boxing council flyweight title he captured from Thai Chatchai Sasakul on Dec. 24, 1998 in Thailand, Pacquiao suffered an embarrassing third-round knockout loss (his second) at the hands of Medgoen Singurat of Thailand on Sept. 27, 1999. Technically, Pacquiao had lost the title when he climbed into the ring when he weighed more than the 112-pound (51 kg) limit.
Pacquiao knows therefore how excruciating a weight control regimen is. What makes up for the weight loss he undergoes in almost all his pre-David Diaz fight (at 135 pounds, the lightweight limit), is his backbreaking type of training which could kill those less endowed. I would even venture to say that, it was his hard training that probably saved him in his third fight with Mexican legend Erik Morales whom he knocked out in the third round on Nov. 18, 2006.
It will be recalled that Pacquiao was running a temperature minutes before entering the ring and Roach came very close to calling the fight off if only to protect Pacquiao from harm. It was Pacquiao?s tip-top condition that allowed him to fight despite the fever and dispose off Morales in convincing fashion.
Now comes Ricky Hatton who seems to be a natural light welterweight and who went up to welterweight to fight Floyd Mayweather Jr. Hatton seemed to be bringing the fight to Mayweather, constantly pressuring, a la Pacquiao, the world?s best pound-for-pound fighter.
