Manny Pacquiao is a Filipino Boxer born on December 17, 1978. He has a Southpaw stance and has been a World Champion in professional boxing. He has been nicknamed ‘Pacman’. Earlier in the year, he had a fight with Floyd Mayweather in which he suffered a defeat.
It is being rumored that his next fight might be the final one of his career as he is looking to concentrate on his political career as a senator. There have been no official announcements regarding his next and final opponent but a shortlist featuring three names has surfaced.
The list contains the names of Amir Khan, Terence Crawford and Timothy Bradley. Amir Khan was Pacquiao’s sparring partner in the past. Crawford is the undefeated WBO light welterweight champion while Bradley is the WBO welterweight champion. Who among these three boxers Pacquiao finally decides to face in his last bout is yet to be announced.
According to Dan Rafael of ESPN, Pacquiao should have already made the decision by now as he was supposed to make an announcement regarding his choice on 11th December. However, the Filipino fighter abstained from making such an announcement stating that he needed more time to decide on his next opponent.
Bob Arum, the head of Top Rank Promotions and also Manny’s promoter was taken by surprise by the delay in Manny’s decision making regarding his next opponent. At the same time he also stated that it was his personal life and personal decision and we should all patiently wait for the time when he finally decides to shed some light on the whole matter.
Arum was asked in an interview whether fans could possibly see a rematch between Pacquiao and Mayweather. He answered this question by stating that the chances of such a thing happening are very low. He further added that Mayweather was retired and a Pacquiao-Mayweather rematch looks like a really bleak prospect at the moment.
Rumors are suggesting that Arum wanted Amir Khan to be his last opponent but the Filipino Southpaw is more prone to choose Bradley as Bradley is a person with whom Pacquiao is more familiar with.
A renowned website reported that the Jeff Mayweather, the uncle of Floyd Mayweather Jr. is of the opinion that if Manny decides to face Crawford, he would very likely wind up on the losing side.
He pointed out that Crawford has the ability to freely switch between stances and combined with his powerful punches, it would be a definite advantage that he would have over Pacquiao. If indeed such a match happens, fans would very likely see Pacquiao knocked out cold as he has been quite a few times in the past.
Crawford has had an impressive career till date with 27 victories and no losses and 19 of those 27 victories coming by knockout. Crawford and his team have already started preparing for the possible fight in order to be on the safe side. The final match of Pacquiao is supposed to take place at the MGM Grand Las Vegas on 9th April.
Arum stated that he believes that Pacquiao would decide and make a decision by that time and thus hopes that he will be able to present Pacquiao to the fans at the MGM. However, if Pacquiao decides against showing up at the event, some other fighters will have to be found to keep the show going.
Pacquiao is known to make late announcements for his matches as fans had previously seen in the case of the Mayweather fight which took place on May 2nd but the announcement for the match came on Feb 20th which resulted in the boxers not getting even two and a half months to prepare themselves for the match.