… & Manny Pacquiao’s Place in Welterweight Division
This week’s Left-Hook Lounge goes to a video format, as fight scribe Vivek Wallace breaks down the true definition of “Pound-for-Pound” and sheds light on who it may apply to today. The boxing media and fans hand the title out like water bottles on a hot Miami day.
Unfortunately, not everyone deserves the mantle. In this “everyone-gets-a-trophy” era of the sport, Boxing has allowed fighters to amass wealth and status before they’ve truly accomplished anything. This is more of a detriment to the fighters and the sport than a benefit to it. By understanding the truth behind the term and implementing it, the sport can finally restore integrity to the collective judgment of fans and media, and give fighters a reason to truly put in the work. Also covered will be a look back at the aftermath between Lopez and Lomachenko. Video posted of Lomachenko’s injury and subsequent surgery have made some question the final results. But should they?
It would be a lot more believable if Lomachenko’s pressured resurgence came early in the fight. Sadly, his best work came almost 8 rounds into the fight and there’s no conceivable way to believe that he was truly injured after putting in such a performance at a point when a fighter is naturally more fatigued. Add to that the insulting contract given to Team Lopez and it produces the very situation we have now where Team Lopez would prefer to just move on. It should be duly noted that Team Loma had the leverage. They left the rematch clause out and now they’re the odd man out! Sad but true.
In the final question covered, we take a look at the legendary Manny Pacquiao’s spot in the welterweight division. Despite the emergence of Porter, Spence Jr., Garcia, and Crawford, Pacquaio remains in the thick of things and proved his mettle once again by defeating the hardest puncher of the welterweight class, Keith Thurman. In his bout with Thurman, Pacquiao proved that he can not only take a thunderous shot, but also showed that he’s still fast and powerful enough to land a few of his own. It’s an incredibly remarkable feat to be able to not only remain relevant after 25 years, but still be able to perform at a level high enough to prevent the young guns from removing you from the scene. In this mailbag, we’ll chew on this topic at great length. Tune in and subscribe today!
(Vivek “Vito” Wallace can be contacted at 954.770.9807 or at vivekwallace1251@gmail.com. He can also be seen on “Official Left-Hook Lounge” Youtube Channel or FB in daily fight threads).