Earlier today I received a text from welterweight hopeful Karim Mayfield, who seemed to be in a bit of an exuberant mood. This definitely wasn’t your typical ‘hello’ message, as the San Francisco-based hitter seemed to have a lot on his mind in regards to the hollow steroids accusations against Manny Pacquiao earlier today.
A ridiculous article, which now appears to have been taken down from the website FinanceBusinessArticles.com, was penned by an anonymous individual who claimed to have interviewed an ex-Pacquiao sparring partner who said that the Filipino idol had been using steroids and later HGH dating back to his December 2008 fight with Oscar De La Hoya.
I try to make it routine to stay out of the steroid saga often connected to Pacquiao but Mayfield was definitely in the talking mood and I’m not one to turn a fighter down if they have something to say. Karim also happened to serve as one of Pacquiao’s chief sparring partners for his recent victory over Shane Mosley at the MGM Grand last weekend and he knows all to well of the abilities of the 32-year old champion.
Mayfield started our conversation off with conviction in his voice.
“I can’t judge any of his prior fights but I’m sure, almost 100% sure, that the man couldn’t have been on steroids,” said Mayfield. “There were no things that I have seen to where I was in awe of him. I never thought he had this super power or this super speed. I’ve never seen no superman stuff out of him that would indicate he was on steroids. Yes, he was faster than other guys I sparred with but it wasn’t super blazing and he did have power but it wasn’t like no super power.”
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Taking things further, Mayfield seemed to point out that the eight-division champion often was under par during their sessions together.
“I’ve definitely seen days where he had good days and where he had bad days. I definitely saw several bad days where he was tired from sparring, you know what I mean? I don’t even see how steroids could be attached to him,” Mayfield continued.
Pacquiao’s defeat of Mosley was very lackluster outside of his third round knockdown of the former champion, even to the point that some say they saw weaknesses in his attack. I was curious for Mayfield’s thoughts on the fight.
“Yeah, definitely,” Karim answered when I asked if he felt that much of the accusations slung towards Pacquiao stemmed from jealousy. “More or less it wasn’t Pacquiao’s performance. It was what Mosley didn’t do. It was what Mosley couldn’t do. It wasn’t what Pacquiao did it was what Mosley didn’t do.”
I also asked Mayfield if he was shocked that Pacquiao, who claimed his first victory as a professional fifteen years ago at 106 pounds, was able to incredibly rise in weight in later in his career. Mayfield spoke of a man impressed but far from shook.
