Can you say highway robbery?
This has to be the worst, most obvious, pure robbery to ever take place in boxing history. Manny "Pacman" Pacquiao squared off against the tough Timothy Bradley late last night, June 9th, and despite what everyone who watched the fight saw (which was Pacquiao winning), the judges scored it a split 115-113 decision for Bradley! The only judge who had the fight in favor of Pacquiao only had him winning 115-113, which is still absurd!
Pacquiao dominated Bradley throughout the entire fight. Point, blank, period. If you wanted to score a few rounds for Bradley at all, it would have been the final two, 11th and 12th rounds, when Pacquiao did seem to slow down and appear fatigued a bit.
From the opening bell, both fighters came out ready to fight. Bradley actually started off by throwing some good punches to Pacquiao's face and body. His jab was a factor in the beginning. However, by the second half of the round, Pacman did what he does best and flipped the script on Bradley, by landing that strong straight left hand to Bradley's face time and again. These were not glancing shots, these were solid, crisp, hard hitting left hand bombs.
In the 2nd round Pacman became more aggressive and rocked Bradley with a variety of hard punches, from straight left hands, to right hooks, and loads of uppercuts from both hands that had Bradley's legs visibly wobble. From the 1st-5th round, Pacman hit Bradley hard repeatedly and had him dazed on a number of occasions. From the 6th-10th Pacquiao picked his shots, blocked most of what Bradley threw, and landed heavy, clean punches repeatedly. No matter what Bradley threw at Pacquiao, nothing hurt the Filipino superstar fighter. He ate every punch that Bradley threw at him in true "Pacman" fashion.
Bradley clearly got rocked backward and had to retreat when Pacquiao would start to land his vicious combinations. All the while Pacman remained calm and extremely poised throughout the duration of the fight. He would even smile at the commentators Jim Lampley, Max Kellerman, and Emanuel Steward when Bradley would try to hit him or when they were tied up in close range. Pac smiled at Bradley directly a number of times too and urged him to come forward and throw punches, seeming as though he was simply toying with Bradley at times.
The unofficial scorecard at the end of the bout had Pacquiao winning an obvious and easy decision of 119-109, so how is it then that these judges even came up with these incredibly disgusting scores of 115-113 to give the fight to Bradley? Did someone pay these judges under the table? Did the judges gamble and bet money on Bradley winning, since the odds were set at 5-1 in favor of Pacquiao? That would mean if they did bet on Bradley, they would win a load of money if he won and therefore serve as motivation to rob Pacquiao of a much deserved victory. There are a lot of questions to be asked here.
However, what is certain is the facts:
Pacquiao landed 253 punches on Bradley, with 190 of them being POWER PUNCHES.
Bradley landed 159 punches in total.
So honestly, this decision makes no sense at all. Pacquiao's promoter, Bob Arum, was utterly shocked when the robbery was announced.
"Can you believe that? Unbelievable. I went over to Bradley before the decision and he said, 'I tried hard but I couldn't beat the guy.' I've never been as ashamed of the sport of boxing as I am tonight."
Pacquiao responded with a short, simple, and confident answer when asked if he believed he had won the fight, "Absolutely, yes."
Bradley on the other hand, said a few suspect comments during his post fight interview. ''I thought I won the fight. I didn't think he was as good as everyone says he was. I didn't feel his power," but then shortly afterward made this contradictory statement, "He hurt me a couple of times with his left. He's a beast.'' Does that sound funny? Regardless, it seems as though these two are destined for a rematch in November.
People around the world are absolutely shocked. Many celebrities, professional athletes, boxing analysts, and general fans have since tweeted their disapproval about the final judgement. Vince Carter, Reggie Bush, Aaron Rodgers, and many others have all voiced their opinions about the completely unjust robbery that those judges handed to Manny Pacquiao.
An investigation should really be done to look into whether or not those judges were betting on the fight or paid under the table to insure that Bradley won. This is truly a disgusting showing of corruption in boxing and the worst robbery ever committed in the sport.
What a shame. Pacquiao shouldn't feel bad though. He clearly won that fight.
Renowned boxing trainer, Teddy Atlas said it best, "Only one person won that fight. Manny Pacquiao won that fight."
