Pacquiao!!!!!!
I was stronger, bigger than Erik, says Manny
By Francis Ochoa
Inquirer
Last updated 01:35am (Mla time) 11/20/2006
Published on page A1 of the November 20, 2006 issue of the Philippine Daily Inquirer
LAS VEGAS -- The night before the fight and until the wee hours of the following morning, Manny Pacquiao shivered miserably in the cold silence of his suite as he battled a fever triggered by a sore throat.
By Saturday evening, it was the Filipino ring sensation who was inflicting misery on a hapless foe.
In a fiery display of punching power and speed, Pacquiao stopped fabled arch nemesis Erik Morales in the third round of their trilogy-capping bout in a jampacked and loud Thomas & Mack Arena, forcing the Mexican to face an uncertain future for the first time in his illustrious career.
Pacquiao knocked Morales down three times in the match, including the last time that nailed the Mexican to the canvas for good with three seconds left in the third round via a dazzling combination that flaunted Pacquiao’s new and improved right hook.
“I was stronger than him, I was bigger than him,” Pacquiao said after the match.
The action-packed triumph validated Pacquiao’s stoppage of Morales in January, a victory that the vanquished had dismissed as a fluke, claiming that he was never really hurt by the General Santos City native.
This time, in the third installment of their storied rivalry, Pacquiao made sure Morales would feel the pain. Thrice over.
Next in line for Pacquiao is a rematch with Marco Antonio Barrera for the Mexican’s World Boxing Council super featherweight crown next year.
The WBC had earlier mandated that Barrera fight the winner of the third Pacquiao-Morales showdown for his next title defense.
After earning $3 million like Morales in what proved to be an abbreviated fight, Pacquiao is expected to earn a lot more in his next meeting with Barrera, whom he stopped in the 11th round of their non-title clash in November 2003.
Pet left
Two right hooks rocked Morales in the second round, before Pacquiao launched his pet left straight that decked the Tijuana native for the first time that night.
“In the second round, I knew he was surprised by my right hook so I kept throwing it,” said the 27-year-old former world champion, who retained his WBC international super featherweight title with the victory.
He threw his right hook some more in the third round, scoring the second knockdown with 1:05 left and then using it in a vicious combo that set up his killer left again for the haymaker.
Morales went down, slowly looked at his corner with a glassy stare while referee Vic Drakulich was counting him out, then he turned to Drakulich and shook his head. The referee waved the fight over and the coliseum -- at least the pro-Pacquiao part of it --exploded into cheers.
Pacquiao, a former two-time world champion, thus improved to 43-3-2 (win-loss-draw) after scoring his 33rd career knockout.
Morales, who had never been knocked down in his entire career until running into Pacquiao in January, suffered a second straight stoppage at the hands of the same person expected to take his place as the iron-fisted ruler of the super featherweight ranks.
Sore throat
Morales now has a 48-5 record to ponder on as he decides his future.
For most of Friday evening, it was Pacquiao’s future that was hanging in the balance.
Struck by a sore throat, the 27-year-old demigod developed a fever and started feeling nagging pains all over his body, according to a Team Pacquiao insider.
He was given medication to keep his temperature in check, which hit 38.5 degrees Celsius at one point. Still Pacquiao arrived at the spanking arena on the University of Nevada-Las Vegas campus feeling sore and unable to break a sweat because of his high body heat.
It was not enough to slow him down, however.
After the introduction ceremonies drowned out by the din of the loud crowd, Pacquiao and Morales got right down to work in the first round and early in the second with the furious exchanges that had become a trademark of their tussles.
Raw end of exchanges
Morales, though, got the raw end of those exchanges.
And in the end, Morales, for so long the proud Aztec warrior who refused to admit getting stung in a boxing match, was finally made to face the painful truth, one which could lead him to where his road ends.
“For the first time in my career, I finally felt the power of my opponent,” said a sullen Morales through an interpreter atop the ring right after the match ended.
“Maybe it’s getting to that time,” he added, fueling talk that he would retire soon.
Stripped of the mythical aura that enveloped a career headed for the Hall of Fame, Morales addressed the media briefly in the post-fight press conference, his voice quaking and his eyes reddened by the welling of tears as he spoke vaguely of a fight in his native Tijuana.
Surprised superstar
But if it indeed this were his last big bout, it sure ended too quickly for the boxing superstar, that even Pacquiao was surprised.
“I thought it was going to be a long fight with a lot of action,” Pacquiao said. “I was prepared to face the best of Morales.”
But Morales, who was accompanied to the ring by wrestling star Rey Mysterio, admitted that somewhere in those furious exchanges which his granite chin used to survive with ease during his younger days, he caught a glimpse of the end of the match.
“I could have boxed but it would not have mattered,” he said. “He would have gotten me sooner or later. He’s that good.”
Freddie Roach, Pacquiao’s trainer, seconded that statement.
‘A lot of heart’
“Erik showed a lot of heart and took a lot of shots out there,” Roach said. “But Manny is [simply] the best fighter in the world pound-for-pound today.”
After Pacquiao turned Morales’ legs to jelly in the second round, Roach instructed his ward to “stand in front of him and keep [the] fast footwork. Keep laying those combinations.”
“Erik needs to set up a punch and every time he made moves, he had to readjust,” said Roach. “So Manny fought exactly the way I wanted him to.”
The 30-year-old Morales stuck to the game plan of trying to get a win early, engaging Pacquiao in a brawl several times, but the latter was unfazed.
The Mexican, a former three-time world champion himself, had to employ fitness specialists to make the 130-lb limit, but in so doing was not expected to last the distance against the durable Pacquiao.
Roach said Morales’ chance was to go for a quick win, but to do that he had to fight toe-to-toe with the Filipino and that proved a mistake.
“He kept coming at me but he could not handle me,” said Pacquiao, who after handing Morales his only two career defeats via knockouts, had actually floored the Mexican five times in the last four rounds that they had mixed it up.
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2006-11-19 14:55:47
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