people seem to be confused as to how pac is more dominant at the higher wieghts but you have to take into account that pac had already fought better guys under 135. morales, barerra and marquez are better then clottey, cotto and hatton. the only other fighter who you can put on the level of mab, jmm and em was dlh but dlh was too big for 147, at 35. so its a combination of pac being able to get bigger and stronger and fighting guys who good but not great like the guys pac fought at 130 and below. the only real challenge for pac is winner of may-mosley. thats it.
People should also look at his fight weight.....against dlh pac took no good shots, he used his movement, speed, angle and combo hits to launch his attacks and get the hell out of the way. Against cotto, again, he favoured his chances, he took a little punishment at the start but fired off his own hits which were just quicker so he could land more than cotto and stronger. Against clottey, he was fighting a punching bag his used to drain himself loads at lower weights lfc
you got a good point, there. seems like pac was always bigger then he looked. and at these higer wieght classes, nobody, except for mayweather is as fast as him. there is no exceptionally dominant welterwieght out there, including mayweather.
Yup, there was a great thread once with a graph of pacmans fight night weight over the years. The change was less than mayweathers! showing he actually gained less weight over time than floyd which throws everything about the drug stuff out of the window. lfc
Good point. Just looking at how Pac dominated a fighter like Barrera, it shouldn't be too suprising that he has had sucess against lesser albeit bigger opposition. I also think the weight issue is often seen as too important when assessing the outcome of a fight. We have seen numerous fighters go up in weight for decades and beat bigger opposition. Hearns went from welter to cruiser, Jones and Toney from middle to heavy, Duran from lightweight to middleweight. Even going further back guys like Langford, Armstrong, Walker and many other guys have gone up and competed against much naturally bigger men.
exactly. you can just look at how many divisions a guy jumped but you also have to look at the opposition. duran went up to a bunch of weight classes having to deal with guys like benintez, hearns, leonard, hagler. as it stands there are no dominant guys at 147 like there were say a few years back when you had a prime trinidad, prime dlh, prime mosely or a prime forest right after that.
No objections to anything but the highlighted portion. Pac has a good challenge or two at 140 pounds waiting for him, imo. I think Devon Alexander could be a very interesting match-up. Bradley too, who I think earned his shot at the linear title.
Also, I think it helped a lot that the fighters he has faced in the higher weights are mostly the stocky, brawler types. They may be bigger than him, but he never really has a lot of trouble getting to them and hitting them. He hasnt yet really faced a lively, long and rangy pure boxer who fights tall. (140-147 is the bottom limit for the naturally tall, big framed guys) Boxers with long limbs, far reaching jabs and great punching leverage.
bradley and alexander still have to prove more to be along the level of a pacquiao or mayweather. sure they might be able to them trouble but they're arent at the level yet. but no doubt they are the premier guys at 140. cant wait for them to fight eachother.
After 130, his opposition has been **** compared to 130 and below. He fights a guy (David Diaz) who became champion for ghetting the win, a CONTREVERSIAL decision against a SHOT to hell Morales. He fights an exposed, china chinned Hatton who was previously raped by Mayweather. He fights a weight drained SHOT to hell DLH. He fights a damaged Cotto. He fights his co-worker, who loses all his big fights, who couldn't even beat a one eyed, damaged Cotto that he (Pac) easily beat.
so basically every fighter with a loss was shot, damaged or exposed? he fought the best 140 fighter, the ring champ, he fought a cotto in his best shape and cotto was at his best. he fought oscar coming up from 134 which he weighed in his last fight to 147! lfc
Marquez is not that great. Barrera and Morales were greate. I am not sure why people put Marquez in the great category.
Sorry dude, can't deny the facts. He fought the highest rated 140 fighter, but you cannot deny that he was past his best. He was brutally KO by Mayweather, nearly KO by lighthitting Collazo, and Lazcano. I can't hate on Pac for fighting Hatton, he was the man at 140, but I can't deny his is **** either. Saying Cotto was at his BEST is bull****. He was made to come in at 145, secondly he was brutally destroyed by Margarito, not a 1 punch KO ala Rahman-Lewis, BRUTALLY destroyed ala Chavez-Taylor. NOT HIS BEST. And Ivan Calseron would have kicked Oscar's ass that night. Oscar could barely even stand on his own two feet walking into the ring FFS. IV marks on his ARMS!! That's reality.
you wouldnt put marquez on the level of morales and barerra? think his two fights with pac validate him, no?