RING?S POUND FOR POUND RANKINGS UNFAIR TO PACQUIAO
By Ronnie Nathanielsz
PhilBoxing.com
Fri, 18 Sep 2015
Ring Magazine in its latest pound for pound rankings following the announced retirement of Floyd Mayweather Jr has elevated No.2 ranked Roman ?Chocolatito? Gonzalez to the top spot but has inexplicably and unfairly dropped eight division champion Manny Pacquiao who was at No. 6 in the previous rankings to No. 8.
The demotion of Pacquiao contrasts sharply with the Ring?s elevation of Andre Ward who was not even listed in the top ten in the previous ranking to No. 2.
Mike Rosenthal of Ring sought to justify the decisions of the editorial board when he stated that they ?used Mayweather?s departure as an opportunity to reconfigure the RING Pound-for-Pound Top 10 to better reflect the current state of talent. That process was anything but easy, as we endured an exhaustive process of give-and-take before making our decisions.?
He admitted that they met with some resistance over Ward?s No. 2 ranking because of ?his relative inactivity the past few years and weak opponent in his comeback fight, Paul Smith.?
Ring conveniently noted that Pacquiao ?is coming off his loss to Mayweather and is only 3-3 in his past six fights but we agreed that he remains a formidable opponent for anyone.?
They failed to recognize some important facts in their hurry to elevate Ward. To begin with Pacquiao faced Mayweather with an injured shoulder for which he sought the permission of the Nevada State Athletic Commission to take a pain killing injection on the day of the fight but was denied and aggravated a tear in his rotator cuff apparently in the fourth round when he had Mayweather in some trouble.
Mayweather, on the other hand received intravenous injections on the night before the fight but only informed the NSAC some 20 days later and they granted him retroactive exemption.
Besides, the scorecards of the three judges hardly gave credit to Pacquiao who was the aggressor.
Ring also conveniently failed to take into account that Pacquiao?s loss in his first fight with Timothy Bradley was a travesty that was condemned, universally forgetting that he dropped world light welterweight champion Chris Algieri six times en route to a one-sided beating and also won by a lopsided decision in a rematch with Bradley while he also beat tough Brandon ?Bam Bam? Rios handily.
Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia reported that Andre Ward spent all of 2014 inactive, still feuding with Dan Goossen who died of complications from liver cancer in September 2014 leaving the future of Ward?s boxing career even further in doubt.
It also said that on February 19, 2015 The Ring reportedly stripped Ward of his Ring Championship Belt due his not having defended his title against a top 5 contender in the last two years.
Boxing News reported now that Floyd Mayweather has finally called time on his illustrious career (or so he claims) after a routine win over Andre Berto, attention has turned to the question of who will replace him atop the mythical pound-for-pound list.
The site noted that these lists are of course subjective and there is no way of definitively compiling a list of the top 10 boxers on the planet, but the topic is inevitably debated.
Boxing News said ?given that Mayweather, undoubtedly the best in the world while active, has vacated his throne, Boxing News reported it has ?installed Manny Pacquiao as the new pound for pound leader? noting that ?prior to his decisive points loss to Mayweather in May, the Filipino icon held the no 2 spot on most pound-for-pound lists ? which was one of the key reasons for the fight generating gargantuan amounts of revenue and attention.?
Boxing News recognized that while ?public opinion over Pacquiao may have turned slightly sour given his relatively underwhelming performance, and the revelation of his shoulder injury, losing to the best fighter on the planet should not send a fighter several places down the pound-for-pound rankings. Quite simply, now that Mayweather has seemingly retired, everyone has moved up a place.
While noting that the fight Pacquiao ?produced against Floyd seems a far cry from his emphatic wins over the likes of Oscar De La Hoya, Miguel Cotto and Ricky Hatton, it?s a little early to label Pacquiao as a spent force.
Boxing News pointed out that ?indeed, many wrote him off after his knockout loss to Juan Manuel Marquez in 2012, only for Manny to return and outpoint the highly-talented Tim Bradley before setting up his clash with Mayweather.?
Boxing News contends that the 36 year old Pacquiao remains one of the most exciting fighters on the planet,? with blurring hand-speed and footwork as well as thunderous power ? though time is certainly taking its toll, Pacquiao is still one of boxing?s most dangerous combatants and it takes a fighter of Mayweather?s caliber to beat him? while pointing out that his ?meteoric rise through the weight classes is the stuff of legend and he has handily beaten some of the best fighters of this generation. While compelling arguments can be made for the likes of Gennady Golovkin, Terence Crawford and Andre Ward to be the pound-for-pound number one, they are yet to prove themselves in as many career-defining fights as Pacquiao.?
In conclusion Boxing News stated that ?Those three in particular are hot favorites to claim world supremacy in the future but for now, the Filipino veteran once again rules the roost.?
Click here to view a list of other articles written by Ronnie Nathanielsz.
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