-Pacquiao vs. Margarito Set for the WBC Junior Middleweight Title, but Fought at 150 lbs-
Imagine we live in a parallel universe. One in which Bill Gates suddenly decides he would like to add the title of 100m World Champion to his already impressive CV. Gates hires the best trainers money can buy and sets about turning himself into a world class sprinter. After a couple of years hard work and improving to sub-12 second standard, Gates uses some of his considerable wealth to offer Usain Bolt an incredible amount of money to face him for the official crown of “World 100m Champion”.
However, to improve his chances, Gates insists Bolt run while wearing a pair of wellington boots. No boots, no deal. It would still be a fantastic achievement should Gates win, but would he really be the world champion?
Meanwhile, the winner of the recent £113m European Lottery (that’s $180m for our American readers) realizes that his riches can enable him to quit work and concentrate on his dream of becoming the world’s greatest tennis player. He moves to Florida, employs the best coaches available and through sheer hard work and natural skill becomes a decent top 100 player. This isn’t good enough though and he offers Roger Federer a blank check to face him in one final match, the winner to be named “The World’s Greatest Tennis Player”.
To make it a more even playing field though, Federer can only write his own check if he plays with a badminton racquet. Could he honestly be considered the best if he won?
Now, let’s come back to the real world and a less extreme but very similar case. A boxer decides to challenge for a world title. However, to make it a fairer fight, he insists his naturally bigger opponent must sacrifice this advantage and weigh in below the division’s set limit.
Much is being made of Manny Pacquiao aiming to win a world title belt in an 8th weight class when he faces Antonio Margarito on November 13th, at the spectacular Cowboy Stadium in Dallas, Texas. On the night, Michael Buffer will take 5 minutes to introduce Pacman as he lists all the various titles he has won throughout his incredible career and declare the fight as being for the “WBC Junior Middleweight Championship of the World!” What he probably won’t announce is the fact that neither man will be allowed to weigh in within 4lbs of the 154lb divisional limit.
Pacquiao’s rise to the top of the pound for pound rankings has come on the back of spectacular performances against naturally bigger men. Oscar De La Hoya, Ricky Hatton, Miguel Cotto and Joshua Clottey have all been dealt with frightening ease by the whirlwind from the Philippines. Pacquiao’s mixture of speed and power, combined with his awkward southpaw style, have made him more effective as he has moved up in weight.
Pacquaio’s speed has been accentuated by the comparative slowness of his opponents. His run of form over the last 2 years has been unprecedented, certainly in the modern era, and propelled him to the top of the pound for pound rankings not just now, but for the entire generation, and perhaps for all time.
As likeable and exciting as Pacquiao is, there is however a darker side to his recent success. As ever in boxing, money rules and Pacquiao’s rise in popularity has seen him (or his team)
become able to engineer his career to suit himself. The Pacquiao camp is now in a position where they can choose the opponents they would like to face, offer them the biggest purse they
are ever likely to earn, but add the condition that they can choose the weight the bout will be fought at. No fighter will turn down the offer. The sport is known as prizefighting after all, and as nice as world title belts are to have, it must also be very satisfying to have an extra $5 million in your bank account.
Starting with the December 2008 clash with De La Hoya, the Margarito bout is the 3rd to be contested at a weight designed specifically to suit the Filipino. More worryingly, it is the 2nd to be fought for an official ‘world’ title. Although the fight is for the vacant WBC 154 lbs title, neither fighter will be permitted to weigh in an ounce over 150lbs. This isn’t a problem for the once flyweight Pacquiao, but for Margarito losing those extra 4lbs could prove extremely difficult, and could rob him of vital quickness, power and endurance heading into the biggest fight of his life.
The Cotto fight was officially for the WBO welterweight title. However, Pacquiao only agreed to take the fight if Cotto agreed to meet at 145lbs, not the 147lbs the weight class allows. Again, this allowed Pacquaio to eat well and build himself up into a new division but forced Cotto to dry himself out and lose those extra pounds. On reflection, Cotto would probably never beat Pacquiao, whichever weight they fought at, but he was the defending champion and should have been able to defend his titles within the rules of the sport.
There have been rumors circulating that if successful in beating Margarito, and unsuccessful in persuading Floyd Mayweather to share a ring, Pacquiao may decide to round out his career with a challenge to middleweight king Sergio Martinez. That would be a fitting end to a fantastic career and if he were to somehow win, and in turn claim the middleweight title, Pacquiao could stake a claim to being the greatest fighter ever to lace up a pair of gloves. If you think the fight would ever happen at 160 lbs though, you either have a romantic vision of the game or don’t understand how the sport works. Top Rank would aim to seek every possible advantage for Pacquiao, and would pay Martinez accordingly.
On November 20th Martinez faces Paul Williams in yet another catchweight bout masquerading as a world title fight. If Martinez is willing to risk his Middleweight title by taking on the dangerous Williams at 157 lbs, then it’s safe to assume he would be willing to let Pacquiao name his weight for the chance to earn a fortune. Call it a hunch, but I doubt that fine, upstanding sanctioning body the WBC would have a problem with making the bout a dual weight class, dual title match.
No, we haven’t stepped back to our parallel world. As ridiculous as this sounds
it wouldn’t be a unique situation. In 1988 Sugar Ray Leonard was allowed to challenge Donny LaLonde for both the WBC Super Middleweight and Light Heavyweight titles in the
same fight. Although both titles were at stake, LaLonde was only permitted to weigh in at the 168 lbs Super Middleweight limit for the fight. Leonard claimed a TKO victory and 2 world titles in one night. To put that into perspective, the lazy Henry Armstrong took a full 3 months to accomplish the same feat, one fight at a time.
A champion should be able to weigh in at the division’s limit and be able to concentrate purely on the battle inside the ring, not the battle to lose weight to accommodate a popular challenger. If a fighter wants to step up into a new division, they should accept that their opponent may hold a natural size advantage and either come up with tactics to combat that or build themselves up and grow into the weight class. It is farcical, but within the next month we could have a light middleweight champion who has never fought a full light middleweight opponent and a new middleweight champion who didn’t beat a middleweight to win the belt!
At a time when boxing need stars and big fights, the increase in the number of catchweight bouts is understandable. Fans are less willing to tolerate mismatches and meaningless mandatory opponents. They want to see the big names taking each other on in tough, competitive fights. Catchweight bouts allow the big names to meet in matches that grab the public’s imagination. By allowing world title fights to be contested at catchweights though, boxing is risking cheapening its rich history and confusing the fans. Pacquiao may win another title in another weight class on November 13th, but what does the title actually stand for?
