It was close but most had Raheem winning, Raheem was pretty much sent to the wilderness after that 'loss' effectively seeing the end of his prime. :verysad
Unfortunately Raheem never was a big name, not even, when he beat Morales. Therefor i think you can´t say, Pac ducked him. But off course a slick boxer like Raheem would´ve caused Pac a lot of trouble.
Simple really, lower risk, higher reward for fighting fighters past their best or at a catchweight so that every advantage is in his hands. To a noob, De La Hoya, Hatton, Margarito and Mosley victories look outstanding. They are not however.
raheem-morales was a 135lbs fight in which Morales didn't even make the weight. Pac on the hand was only on his second fight at 130lbs. besides arum promotes morales and raheem while pac just signed a contract with Gary Shaw. So Arum decided which fighter he'd give to Pacquaio and it was Morales who had a three-fight contract with Pac
Agreed. Raheem beat my man up bad. It was a tough fight to watch. Thats when i knew he was done. Raheem is a terrible fighter though. Everytime that guy would be in trouble against anyone he would "slip". Very very negative fighter. I watched the Funeka KO for days.....
I think there were a lot of factors going into this decision, but the most important one was the money. Morales meant more money, so that is who he fought. I am from Philly, and bet on Raheem to be Morales even. I thought that it was bull**** that he didn't fight Raheem, but then I realized that no one even cared about Raheem except for me and 3 other people. Boxing is about making money, and that is what Pacquiao has been doing.
Why must we settle in the past, Lets look whats in the table now. Or is it that you lost hope for your boy on fighting Pac? haha!
I don't think Pacquiao had ducked Raheem. Morales is the bigger name and money for Pacquiao than Raheem that time, not to say Manny also wanted to avenge his loss with Erik but the story and the fans attention is glued to Morales-Pacquiao match up in which eventually went to a remarkable boxing fight trilogy. If only had Raheem had continued to make noise after beating Morales, he would have got Pacquiao in his radar list to fight.