MANNY LOOKS GREAT, OSCAR DOESN?T LOOK RIGHT
By Ronnie Nathanielsz
PhilBoxing.com
Thu, 04 Dec 2008
Filipino ring icon Manny Pacquiao is in ?cruise control and looks great? but Oscar De La Hoya ?doesn?t look right? according to Pacquiao?s conditioning expert Alex Ariza.
Ariza, in an overseas telephone conversation with www.insidesports.ph, Standard Today and Viva Sports from Las Vegas , said he saw De La Hoya running in the morning at the UNLV campus and ?there was something about his running that didn?t look right to me.?
Ariza said De La Hoya ran around the track about four or five times and ?he stopped and pulled up.? He noted that ?The Golden Boy? was ?well suited up and covered up and was wearing one of those plastic suits? which prompted Ariza to surmise ?I think he (Oscar) has a little problem with the weight to be honest with you.?
The stipulated weight for the "Dream Match" at the MGM Grand Garden Arena on Saturday (Sunday, Manila Time) is 147 pounds and De La Hoya has to come down from his normal weight of around 160 pounds while Pacquiao has no problems moving up from the lightweight limit of 135 pounds when he looked terrific in demolishing David Diaz to win the WBC title by a ninth round knockout.
However, Ariza remained cautious and said he didn?t want ?to read too much into it emphasizing that we are ?just worried about getting our guy ()Manny) ready.?
In contrast to De La Hoya, Ariza revealed that Pacquiao ?did 13 laps at the same place and when he was finished he wasn?t even breathing hard. He was in cruise control.? He said Pacquiao?s sparring partners, Rashad Holloway and Raymund Beltran (who prepared Manny for the Marco Antonio Barrera rematch and the David Diaz title fight) ?pulled up and let Manny go on his own.?
Pacquiao worked out at the nicely laid out ABA Gym and ?pretty much went through the motions? even as Ariza stressed that while ?this is the easy part we are trying to keep Manny from doing too much.? He described it as ?a g ood workout and everything seems good and Manny looks very good.?
The conditioning guru who sees and works with Pacquiao every day is amazed at how good Pacquiao looks physically. ?Every time he takes his shirt off it?s a new shock just to see how he?s developed.?
Despite all of this Ariza admitted he was ?always the nervous one while Freddie (Roach) is more confident than I am.? Roach himself told us ?we are going to beat this (expletive) Oscar.?
Legendary trainer Angelo Dundee, on the other hand, wants De La Hoya to dictate the tempo and terms of his fight against the relentlessly aggressive southpaw.in the fight which will be telecast "live" by Solar Sports on its cable network and in theaters and other venues like bars, pubs and restaurants nationwide and also carried by GMA 7 beginning at 10:00 a.m. with a replay on CS/9 at 9:00 p.m. Manila .
In one of the recent workouts at his Big Bear training camp Dundee who handled such all-time greats as Muhammad Ali and Sugar Ray Leonard told De La Hoya ?I want you to dictate, dictate.?
At the same time the venerable 86 year old trainer told De La Hoya not to go at Pacquiao straight and frontally but to ?give him an angle so that when he goes here, you are here? pointing to some other spot in the ring.
At the same time Dundee played down the height and reach advantage of De La Hoya over Pacquiao saying De La Hoya will win ?because he is the better fighter.?
Click here to view a list of other articles written by Ronnie Nathanielsz.
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