“We’re going to fish out the big shark and not the little fish.”
This was the hardline rhetoric of Marco Antonio Barrera’s chief adviser Roberto Diaz in rejecting the suggestion of American trainer Freddie Roach that the Mexican ring icon should fight first Bobby Pacquiao before calling on a rematch with Bobby’s older brother Manny Pacquiao.
A few days ago, WBC president Jose Sulaiman has informed Team Pacquiao that Barrera is interested and ready to make a mandatory title defense of his WBC super featherweight crown against Pacquiao.
Roach, however, dismissed Barrera’s offer to fight Pacquiao saying he would have much preferred that his ward take on Morales first. Instead, Roach suggested Barrera to fight Bobby.
But Diaz scoffed at Roach’s counter-offer.
“We’ll honestly, when I read that I laughed. I thought that was pretty much funny. I was like ‘woah,’ where did that name come from?Bobby Pacquiao???Is Manny now not wanting to fight Marco? Did Freddie see something? I don’t know, does Freddie know something and doesn’t want to say it?” Diaz told Brad Cooney of boxingtalk.com.
“The last thing I remember about Bobby Pacquiao was him losing, and getting a gift decision against El Famoso Hernandez. The way we see it at Team Barrera and Team Golden Boy is that we are going after the big shark and not the little fish in the sea,” added Diaz.
Diaz said Barrera wants a rematch with Pacquiao badly and that they will try to work things out to make it happen.
“I think everyone has been waiting for this fight, the fans deserve it, and Marco wants it bad. We haven’t seen this fight already because of conflicting schedules, and the team deciding that it wasn’t the right moment,” said Diaz.
“I think right now after Manny’s very convincing victory over Erik Morales, Manny is on top of the world. Marco Antonio Barrera is the unified champion at 130lb, so lets make the fight.”
“If Pacquiao’s people doesn’t see it that way, they have to understand that Barrera has other avenues, there a couple of world champions that we can unify, or go up into the lightweight division, but this is the fight everyone wants to see, and I think we should give it to them.”
Diaz is optimistic they will get this fight where Barrera yearns to eliminate what he considers a thorn in his decorated career. For the record, Barrera suffered the worst and most humiliating defeat in his career at the hands of Pacquiao during their first encounter in November 2003.
“We’ll I would like to say to all boxing fans in general, I want to let them know Barrera will fight against Manny Pacquiao. There is a thorn in Marco’s side, he’s very quiet about it. Marco doesn’t call out fighters, he does his work in the ring, with that said expect this fight! Believe it! we will get this fight, it’s just around the corner! To all of Marco Antonio Barrera’s fans, the time has come!Marco will get his revenge, he will get his fight with Manny Pacquiao.”
