After struggling for 12 rounds against the underrated challenger Timothy Bradley, Jr., the verdict on Manny Pacquiao?s physical capacities and capabilities as a boxer was almost unanimous: Speed and dexterity were absent, proofs that Father Time has caught up with the PacMan.
The cruel conclusion was justified.
Watching Pacquiao in action against Bradley was like watching the PacMan?s old fights against Marco Antonio Barrera, Erik Morales, Ricky Hatton, Oscar De La Hoya, Miguel Cotto and Antonio Margarito?in slow motion.
Visibly gone were the cat-like quickness, the dexterity and the agility that he displayed in his previous fights which earned the ?oohs? and the ?aahs? of the boxing fans and the nod of the ringside judges.
In the Bradley fight, Manny Pacquiao was like a cart following a horse and an aging gunfighter who could no longer pull the trigger.
In the many instances where the Manny Pacquiao of old would have rained his opponent with a staccato of punches coming from all directions, the boxer who was in the ring with Bradley could only throw at most a three-punch combination, two of which missed the target.
Was Manny Pacquiao?s performance against Bradley a tell-tale sign that he is old?
The Philippines? leading musculoskeletal expert, Dr. Isagani Leal of the Center for Musculoskeletal Science, Asia, who closely observed Pacquiao?s movements in his fight against Bradley, says leg muscle problems which the PacMan earlier complained about, not age, slowed him down in his fight against the American challenger.
?I watched the fight in a closed-circuit television and I closely observed Manny?s movements and I noticed that somewhere in the later part of the first six rounds, he started stretching and pumping his legs,? Dr. Leal said.
The leg movements, the Israel-trained musculoskeletal expert said, appeared to be skips and hops but they were actually manifestations of the tightening of the leg muscles which impeded Pacquiao?s mobility inside the ring.
?It was evident that Manny was having pain in those legs and that explained why he did not move as much as he wanted to,? said Dr. Leal.
Dr. Leal, 45, who looks after members of the Talk and Text basketball team, the ABAP national boxing team and athletes of the different universities in Metro Manila, had earlier said that the massage therapy that Pacquiao goes through every time he suffers from leg cramps would not solve the problem.
Pacquiao, 33, has long been bothered by the leg cramps which affected his performance in his most difficult fights against Juan Manuel Marquez.
There was no serious effort in his camp, however, to really address the problem except for the massage therapy sessions which the Filipino boxing icon went through whenever the problem recurred.
?Modern musculoskeletal science has given us the technology to really probe into the problem muscles through ultrasound,,? Dr. Leal said.
Once identified, he said, the muscle is subjected to a series of non-invasive procedures and therapies to loosen it.
Dr. Leal, who trained for four years in the Sheeba Medical Center in Tel Aviv, Israel under a government scholarship offered by the Department of Health, said that he is willing to perform the procedure on the PacMan ?for free.?
?Im a great fan of Manny Pacquiao and I am willing to do everything to see him get back to his old self and become once again the most exciting fighter in the world today,? Dr. Leal said.
At age 34, Dr. Leal said, a physically fit Manny Pacquiao could still become very exciting in his last two or three fights and could give Floyd Mayweather serious problems should the megabuck fight be realized.
