DONAIRE FIGHTS FOR REDEMPTION
By Eddie Alinea
PhilBoxing.com
Wed, 04 Sep 2013
The Philippines? boxing hero Manny Pacquiao will not be the only Filipino fighter seeking redemption from stunning losses suffered recently in his career.
Fifteen days before the soon-to-be 35-year-old Filipino eight-division champion faces American Brandon Rios on November 24 in Macau, compatriot Nonito Donaire Jr. will be battling Vic Darchinyan 10,000 miles away.
Like Pacquiao, Donaire, acknowledged as the former?s heir apparent earlier in his calling, will be seeking to recapture the glory that was cut short by an unexpected loss to Cuban Olympian Guillermo Rigondeaux early this year.
Pacquiao, who lost his two fights last year, is eyeing the World Boxing Orgnization International welterweight title against Rios, whose undefeated record was snapped by Mike Alvarado early this year.
Pacquiao, who started as a 105-pound campaigner to climb up to as far as 147, was robbed of what could have been an impressive victory over Tim Bradley early in 2012 before losing a heartbreaking sixth round stoppage to arch-nemesis Juan Manuel Marquez by year?s end.
Donaire, the 2012 ?Fighter of the Year? who yielded his world super-bantamweight crown to Olympian Guillermo Rigondeaux in a unification bout last April, meets his former victim in Darchinyan nine days earlier in a 10-round featherweight clash in a venue still to be decided.
Donaire, now 30, rose to fame when, as an unknown flyweight, ended what was Darchinyan?s dream of dominating the 112-pound division by scoring a spectacular fifth round knockout win in 2007 to crown himself the new champion.
The two met separate fates since with the Filipino sustaining his new-found luck crowning himself a super-flyweight, bantamweight and light-featherweight titlist until he met his match in Rigondeaux.
Darchinyan, a southpaw, likewise, moved to junior bantam where he had minor successes but struggled advancing to the 118-pound category.
Darchinyan, in the twilight of his career at 37, first wanted to fight his conqueror at a catch weight 124 but finally agreed in the long run.
After losing to Regondeaux, Donaire, a native of Bohol province, blamed his unpreparedness in that fight against a technical master of a boxer in the person of the Cuban Olympics gold medalist.
Donaire, whose spat with father Nonito Sr., the man who introduced him to sweet science and guided him to the U.S. Olympic team trials in 2000 as an amateur remains, went under the knife later on both his left and right shoulders due to injuries suffered in that Regondeaux bout.
Whether the Filipino, who once in the top five of the best pound-for-pound list, is ready to erase the self-inflicted blot that tainted his career will be known in his November rematch with Darchinyan, who himself will be trying to extricate himself from the hole he dug himself in.
?That remains to be seen,? Top Rank high priest Bob Arum, promoter of both Donaire and Darchinyan, said in an interview with ESPN?s Dan Rafael.
?I don?t know whether we?ll see the Donaire we were used to seeing before the Rigondeaux fight or another version of the Donaire who fought Rigondeaux, so that makes this rematch with Darchinyan interesting,? Arum added.
Click here to view a list of other articles written by Eddie Alinea.
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