Manny proves he's still boxing's elite by dominating Bam Bam

Manny  Pacquiao

After Saturday night’s dominant win over Brandon "Bam Bam" Rios in Macau, China, Manny Pacquiao has proven he is still among boxing’s elite. Manny’s last fight almost a year ago, was a brutal 1punch knockout, by the right hand of Juan Manuel Marquez in their 4^th fight together. The knockout he suffered, are the type of knockouts that change a fighter; change their aggressiveness in the ring, change their ability to absorb punishment and change a fighter’s confidence all together. Not all these question marks were answered because it wasn’t a close fight, but Manny beat a good, tough, durable fighter very convincingly.

Brandon “Bam Bam” Rios is a good fighter, most known for his wins over Peterson, and Alvarado. Rios has a fan pleasing style, he walks forward, he throws bombs and has a granite chin, but is a one dimensional brawler. Rios has poor defense, little head movement, slow on the feet and is tailor made to make Manny look good. Brandon is a good fighter and his name does hold weight, but stylistically, it was very predictable that he would stalk Manny around and eat a lot of leather along the way and that’s exactly what happened in a 12 round unanimous decision win for Manny Pacquiao. Pacquiao used his superior hand speed, great lateral movement, and effective combinations from different angles.  Bam Bam followed Manny throughout the fight but didn’t trade punches with Manny like many predicted, he threw mostly when Pacquiao wasn’t punching. Understandable though, he didn’t want to get caught with vicious counters like Cotto and Hatton did. He fought like Margarito and Clottey that just walked forward handcuffed, taking punishment that leaked through their guard. Rios is still young warrior, with many entertaining fights in his future. The Pac-Man has proved to the boxing world that he is still an elite fighter with at least a few good fights left in him.