23 years ago today: Emmanuel Dapidran "Ang Pambansang Kamao" Pacquiao vs. Nedal "Skinny" Hussein

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Video quality is square root of potato - bad even for it being turn of the millennium, but the PI remained very much a third world country then so no surprise they weren't recording on state of the art 4k equipment.

Probably not a coincidence that not too many uploads of this exist online, and none in high resolution, despite PacMan being arguably the most beloved global boxing star of his generation. That's because it wasn't a very flattering night, and one his faithful may wish they could forget.

Probably the best scion of his Lebanese-Aussie dynasty that saw four brothers involved with the sport, then undefeated "Skinny" arguably ought to have beaten Morales to becoming Pac's third professional conqueror. Not only would this feather in his cap have drastically altered Hussein's career trajectory, just imagine the dominoes that would fall as result. With a defeat here, Pacquiao is almost certainly not landing that HBO PPV date challenging Ledwaba just eight months later (remember, that was his debut and the beginning of his star's ascent for U.S. audiences), nor the rapid avalanche of gilded opportunities that were ushered in by that - over the following decade facing the ATG best three Mexicans in his weight range a combined total of nine bouts.

Carlos Padilla one might say, is pugilism's own Earl Hebner.

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http://boxingtalk.com/A-look-at-the-career-of-Nedal-Hussein-he-almost-beat-Manny-Pacquiao

 

Opportunity, in hindsight, to augment his legacy, which it did. Pac's legend is largely predicated on his rivalries with the Mexican trio. Even drawing with JMM and losing to EM in his first encounter with each contributed to building up the story and hype of their rematches (and there was sufficient meat on the bone that Pac diehards were able to say he got robbed in the former and the latter was razor-thin).

Nothing about my post's tone should have indicated that I was coming at it from a perspective of giving a damn what kind of purses he was getting or anything so mundane and ultimately irrelevant to anyone besides Manny and Jinky and their kids. I'm talking big picture, zoomed-out historical view, legacy-wise. A timeline with Hussein defeating Pacquiao shakes things up quite a bit. Not saying Pac doesn't still have a great career or become champ in several divisions...just that his path as we know it would have been rerouted.

 

I would say without a shadow of doubt losing that recently would absolutely disqualify him from being even a late replacement challenger. HBO always had some measure of proprietary standards unlike many other broadcasting outlets, and in particular for a PPV.

Now, having said that, cream will obviously always rise; with Manny's talent he would have climbed the mountaintop and become a huge global star eventually anyway. Not disputing that. It just would have been a longer and twistier road for him if Skinny had bumped him from the fast track.