It’s hard to imagine a more impressive trifecta than the one Manny Pacquiao has pulled off in the past 11 months: making back-to-back-to-back victories over Oscar De La Hoya, Ricky Hatton and Miguel Cotto look like a walk in the park. The ease of those wins should not make us forget that many “experts” considered each of those such a dangerous exercise that they believed Pac-Man had finally overstepped his bounds – and remember, too, that the “tuneup” for that three-peat was a bout against Juan Manuel Marquez.
The widespread assumption is that the next step for Pacquiao is a 2010 fight for global supremacy against Floyd “Money” Mayweather Jr., but don’t hold your breath. Although at this point neither man needs the dough, there will be the customary wrangling over the division of the purse, but the bigger stumbling block may be Mayweather’s ego. Money can talk all he wants about repeatedly challenging himself, but the fact of the matter is Mayweather likes to have the deck stacked in his favor while presenting the illusion of competitiveness. Which is to say that he doesn’t get himself into fights he’s not absolutely certain he can win.
It’s probably worth noting that Pacquiao promoter Bob Arum said last week that, while he would not stand in the way of a Mayweather fight, if the choice were his and his alone the fight wouldn’t happen at all. . . .
You might not have been surprised by the ease with which Pacquiao handled Cotto – we weren’t – but Yuri Foreman’s unexpectedly strong showing in lifting the WBA super welterweight title from Daniel Santos was a real eye-opener. The light-punching Foreman – a New York-based, Belarus-born citizen of Israel, who is studying to become a rabbi – hadn’t stopped an opponent of any description in more than three years, but had the veteran Santos down in the last round and on the brink on several other occasions in hammering out a one-sided decision. . . .
Another boxing pillar of New York’s Orthodox community, Brooklyn-based junior welterweighht Dmitriy Salita, was the guest of honor at New York’s Solo Kosher Restaurant Thursday, where he received a royal sendoff for his upcoming trip to London to will challenge WBA junior welterweight champion Amir Khan Saturday. Khan, like Pacquiao, is trained by Dedham’s Freddie Roach, who would at this point appear to be the clear favorite to win his fourth Trainer of the Year award.
Oakland Super-charged
When Mikkel Kessler lost his WBA super middleweight title to Andre Ward at the Oracle Arena in last night’s installment of Showtime’s ongoing “Super Six” tournament, it represented Oakland’s first title fight in 42 years – since Hall of Famer Curts Cokes defended his world welterweight title with an eighth-round TKO of Charlie Shipes in the same venue then known merely as the Oakland Arena.
While its organizers are still describing it as the “Super Six,” until a replacement is officially named, the enterprise has been effectively reduced to five contestants, because you can take this much to the bank: Jermain Taylor is not going to fight again, either in this tournament or anywhere else. The frightening knockout he suffered at the hands of Arthur Abraham in Berlin last month was a stark reminder for what the future might hold for the former middleweight champion should he continue to box. . . .
The man from whom Taylor won his middleweight title, incidentally, will be back in the ring 10 days hence: Fighting as a light heavyweight, 44-year-old Bernard Hopkins will face Enrique Ornelas in Philadelphia Dec. 2, with Versus televising. . . . A night later, redundantly-titled “Hustler Boxing” holds stage at New York’s Manhattan Center with junior welterweights Mike Arnaoutis and Tim Coleman meeting for the vacant USBA title in the main event.
A turn-on for HBO
HBO has interesting cards upcoming on the first two Saturdays of December. The Dec. 5 Paul Williams-Sergio Martinez fight is in many respects more intriguing than the Kelly Pavlik-Williams fight it replaced. (Asked last week what the switch in opponents had meant to his preparations, Williams replied with a shrug “the only difference was we needed to get rid of all the right-handed sparring partners and bring in southpaws.”)
A week later, Juan Diaz and Paulie Malignaggi reprise their controversial Houston fight, with the sequel scheduled for Chicago. . . .
We’re not sure Winky Wright-Grady Brewer qualifies as a pay-per-view fight, but their Dec. 11 meeting in San Juan will indeed be shown on PPV.
Throwing Haye-makers
Knocking off 7-foot Russian Nikolai Valuev in Germany two weeks ago made England’s David Haye just the second cruiserweight champion beyond Evander Holyfield to ascend to a heavyweight title. The other big winner on the Nuremberg card was Chelsea’s John Ruiz, who not only gets first crack at the new champion, but finds himself propitiously situated as a promotional free agent for the first time in more than a decade.
With Ruiz already guaranteed what will be the 12th WBA title fight of a 54-bout pro career, attorney/manager Tony Cardinale was at the organization’s convention in Colombia last week, entertaining offers from promoters. While he and Ruiz carefully avoided casting aspersions at Don King, it seemed clear enough that his future plans do not include the World’s Greatest Promoter. “It feels great to be free, especially with another world title shot coming next year,” Ruiz said.
