Roach does not believe Pacquiao will retire soon
By Eddie Alinea
PhilBoxing.com
Wed, 21 Mar 2012
If Manny Pacquiao?s trainer Freddie Roach is to be believed, his ward of 11 years won?t be hanging his gloves soon as he still have what it takes to continue with his chosen career.
Reacting to reports that the World Boxing Organization welterweight champion will be retiring soon, Roach, in an overseas telephone interview with Malaya Business Insight, said Pacquiao will only retire when his career is over.
And it will be he (Roach) who should know whether the Ring Magazine pound-for-pound king?s 17-year boxing career is done.
?Manny?s still hungry to fight and as long as he?s hungry, I will help him as I have done in the past 11 years, ? Roach said. ?Manny, you see, often asked me that when he?s finished will I tell him.?
?Definitely, I told him. Then I asked him, if I tell you, will you listen to me and he said he will,? Roach recalled.
As in previous interviews, Roach did not discount the possibility of the eight-division belt owner fighting undefeated World Boxing Council 147-pound kingpin Floyd Mayweather Jr. being realized.
?Look, we have a big fight coming (against unbeaten junior-welterweight champion Tim Bradley) and Mayweather is also having what is expected a good fight against (Miguel) Cotto. Should they both win, that would pave the way for them to fight each other,?
Asked if the Filipino ring icon?s announcement to retire has got something to do with suspicion by some sectors that he may already on the downtrend as he had shown in his latest fights, including his unimpressive majority decision triumph over arch-rival Juan Manuel Marquez, Roach answered in the negative.
?No one can judge if a fighter is already done merely on the strength of one unimpressive fight, ? he reasoned out. ?That fight was the first fight in a long time, 10 years to be exact, when we had a bad night.?
?A bad night can happen to anyone and Manny is not an exception,? he noted. ?Manny had a lot of distractions the night of the fight and it showed. And it?s not because he had training.?
?We had a great training camp though in Baguio and here in L.A., we really did. It wasn?t nothing wrong with training and so forth. It?s just that his focus wasn?t there the night of the fight,? Roach said.
Roach assured though that it will not happen again.
?Manny, I?m sure learned his lesson from the experience. I expect him to come out with a lot of fire (against Bradley) to win impressively this time,? he vowed.
Pacquiao will be facing Bradley with his WBO 147-pound crown at stake on June 9 (June 10 in Manila) at the MGM Grand in Las Vegas.
Click here to view a list of other articles written by Eddie Alinea.
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