In another masterful, tactical performance in which his hand speed and mobility were once again the key, Floyd Mayweather stayed unbeaten and unified the welterweight championship of the world with a unanimous decision victory over Manny Pacquiao at the MGM Grand in Las Vegas in what became the richest fight in history, disputed in front of a crowd of 16,507 attendees.
Mayweather (48-0, 26 KO) was his usual brilliant self in a fight in which the usually feisty Pacquiao (57-6-2, 38 KO) was barely able to bridge the gap created by Mayweather and his uncanny ability to control the spaces in the ring. Rounds 4 and 6 went unanimously to Pacquiao in almost every scorecard, while a few discrepancies were visible in rounds 8 through 10 in several independent scores.
In the end, judge Dave Moretti scored it 118-110, while Glenn Feldman and Burt Clements saw it 116-112. XN Sports scored it 118-110 for Mayweather, who landed 148 of the 435 punches he threw, almost twice more than the 81 of 429 connected by Pacquiao.
“I’m a calculated fighter. He’s a tough competitor,” said Mayweather, amidst a rain of mostly unearned boos from the crowd, with the marks of the battle barely visible on his face.
“I thought I won the fight. He didn’t do nothing,” said a borderline delusional Pacquiao after the bout, while a report published later indicated that he had suffered a shoulder injury prior to the bout.
The win was also lackluster enough to keep the thought of an eventual rematch limited to Pacquiao’s hardcore fan base, delusional non-boxing characters, and maybe Skip Bayless. And thus, the search for The Man Who Can Connect Two Punches In a Row vs Mayweather is still on.
And unless we start expanding the search to nearby planets or other species of predatory mammals, the search may never end.
