Trainer Eric Brown chimed in with his views on the Floyd Mayweather Jr(47-0, 26KO’s) vs. Manny Pacquiao(57-5-2, 38KO’s) fight when he spoke with Thaboxingvoice.com a few days ago.
Brown’s most recent successes have been with former middleweight champion Peter Quillin and former light-welter and welterweight champion Paulie Malignaggi. Brown has maintained close ties with Freddie Roach’s Wildcard Gym throughout, which of course houses one of the participants for what should be a tremendous spectacle in Pacquiao.
Brown shared the sentiments of a weary observer.
“I’m just glad all the procrastinating is over you know what I mean? It’s a fight that should have happened five years ago, I think it would have been much more exciting at that point but it’s gonna be very exciting even at this point. I’m glad they’ve come to terms with what they gotta do; both are ready to get in the ring and put on the best show they can do. I think it’s gonna be a great fight.”
‘Coming to terms’ sound as if Brown feels both men may have been struggling with the magnitude of an event that is -as Brown and many others have pointed out- is a few years overdue.
No matter, it’s here. Comparisons with this fight and those held between Evander Holyfield and Mike Tyson, and Tyson and Lennox Lewis have been made continuously. In that, all three events took place when the demand for them had become a tad stale, but once they were made the fervour picked right back up again. I believe the same thing is happening now.
So who is Brown picking and why?
“It all depends on who shows up. Floyd’s the master boxer, probably the best boxer in boxing, and you can’t ever play that cheap. I don’t care, they can say he’s getting older, so is Manny, everyone’s getting older you know what I mean? Still Floyd is a master boxer; he’s gotta be the best one in the business and Manny is a great, great fighter. Manny is one of the most formidable fighters, flat-out fighters, in the game today. I think when the two of them meet it’s gonna be fireworks.”
He must have found a comfortable spot on the fence. From these words we are forced to try and identify a subtext; the message beneath the message. If the result does indeed depend on who shows up we have to consider which of the two performs more consistently. That has to be Mayweather given his unwillingness to give up a single round if he can help it, and who often wins points decision by very wide margins while suffering little if any damage. Pacquiao’s come-forward style puts him in the line of fire way more than his American counterpart, and his voluminous punch output is a contributing factor in this.
That is just conjecture on my part. Though I’m forced to stick with my own conclusion as even after a little prodding Brown refused to make a pick in a fight that he sees as an even affair.
“To me it’s a pick ‘em fight. Whoever wins will deserve it, it won’t be no fluke.”
