So I watched the Floyd Mayweather / Manny Pacquiao fight last night and when it was all over, there were lots of shouting and disbelief over the fight itself and its outcome.
You see, I was the only one in the room of 7 people who wanted Mayweather to win. Now let me explain. I am not a fan of Mayweather. If I had to choose who the better human was between Mayweather and Pacquiao, I’ll definitely pick Pacquiao. Pacquiao is all about helping the people of his country while Mayweather is all about helping… Mayweather. But last night was not about being the better human, it was about being the better and smarter fighter. So that’s why I thought Mayweather was going to take it.
Pacquiao walked out to the ring all smiles. At one point, he even stopped and took a selfie, a move the other people in the room saw as a man of confidence. I took the smiles and selfie move as a man who was concerned he was going up against a fighter who had never been defeated. The smiles and selfie I thought, were just Pacquiao’s way of masking his real concerns.
Mayweather on the other hand walked out to the ring all serious, no smiles, no selfie. To me, I took that as a man on a mission, a man who was focus on getting the job done. The other people in the room contrasted Mayweather’s demeanor with that of Pacquiao and concluded Mayweather’s seriousness was because he was concerned. “Mayweather,” they said, “had never had a fighter like Pacquiao and he was afraid of being hit, afraid of losing.”
Then the fight began and Pacquiao did what everyone expected him to do. He went at Mayweather. Pacquiao fought for the people, he tried to give the audience what they paid for. Pacquiao was aggressive and went for the knockout on multiple occasions. But Mayweather was not cooperating to the dismay of the other people in the room with me.
Mayweather did his homework. He knew that going toe-to-toe with Pacquiao would result to a loss. Pacquiao is a brawler in the ring and standing in front of him taking punches and jabs is no way to win a fight. So Mayweather allowed Pacquiao to stay in attack mode from the first round to the last. Mayweather’s only hope was to avoid getting hit while landing some timely punches, and that he did.
In the end, Mayweather was a runner. He spent a lot of time on the ropes trying to get away from the attacking Pacquiao. Needless to say, the people in the room with me were all screaming at the screen, calling Mayweather all sorts of names and totally expressing their frustrations at him for running. But these people, and millions more around the world who felt disappointed by Mayweather’s technique, clearly missed one important aspect of boxing – Defense, the art of avoiding getting hit the best way you can!
At the end of the 12 rounds, Mayweather was called the winner and the room erupted in more screams and disbelief. These people couldn’t understand what had just happened. They saw Pacquiao in attack mode for 12 rounds and they saw Mayweather playing defense the whole time, so as far as they were concerned, Pacquiao won. They couldn’t understand how Mayweather got the win. Then this statistic was shown on the screen – Mayweather landed more punches than Pacquiao.
Pacquiao threw 429 punches, landed 81 for a 19% effective rate. Mayweather threw 435 punches, landed 149 for a 34% effective rate.
Seeing this, I asked the disbelievers in the room, “why do you guys think Pacquiao won when he threw less and landed less punches than Mayweather?”
I got this angry answer in response: “You can’t fight the wind!”
Yes indeed! Yes indeed!
