Manny Pacquiao is not done – says Max Kellerman

By Rob Smith - 08/23/2021 - Comments

Max Kellerman believes Manny Pacquiao still has a lot left despite losing to WBA ‘Super World’ welterweight champion Yordenis Ugas by a 12 round unanimous decision last Saturday night at the T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas.

As Kellerman points out quite astutely, Pacquiao walked into a battle that he was totally unprepared against the former international amateur talent Ugas.

After being out of the ring for two years, the Filipino star Pacquiao underestimated Ugas’ talent by foolishly agreeing to fight him on two weeks’ notice.

Pacquiao would have had trouble with Ugas even with an eight-week camp, but for him to have taken this fight on two weeks’ notice was a crazy decision. Someone should have warned Pacquiao ahead of time that this would be a BAD idea.

You still got to give Pacquiao credit for fighting as well as he did, as he came close to winning. If Pacquiao had thrown another 20 to 30 punches per round, he would have won the fight.

That’s all it would have taken, as he was already out working Ugas. But given the significant power advantage that Ugas had, Pacquiao needed to throw a lot more punches per round to make up for that.

Ugas was an elite former amateur star

“On Max On Boxing, Tim Bradley came on the show, and I said, ‘Ugas has a good chance for an upset,'” said Max Kellerman to ESPN on last Saturday’s upset win by Yordenis.

Manny Pacquiao is not done - says Max Kellerman

“Tim thought he [Ugas] was made for Manny Pacquiao, but here’s my point. Ugas comes from the Cuban school of boxing. It’s a difficult style, a highly effective style if not always crowd-pleasing.

“Ugas was a decorated amateur at the elite amateur level. So if you notice in boxing, the pound-for-pound best usually dominate at the international level of amateur boxing.

“The champions that are lower level pound-for-pound in boxing, not like top 5 or 6 or something like that.

“A lot of times, maybe they didn’t dominate at the elite level of amateur boxing, or sometimes they came from such an impoverished background that they never got that advanced.

They turned pro too early like Manny Pacquiao or someone like that, but otherwise, they came from deep, deep international amateur backgrounds.

“Then the guys that win belts but don’t quite get to that elite championship level were usually dominant or sometimes successful at the national level, but then not great internationally.

“Then the guys that are contenders and maybe they don’t win a belt. Those guys sometimes will win a belt but may not hold it long,” said Kellerman.

It’s interesting how little boxing fans knew about Yordenis Ugas going into last Saturday’s fight with Pacquiao.

The fans only saw that Ugas had four losses on his resume and that one of them was against Shawn Porter.

Had they taken a close look, they would have seen that Ugas was a great amateur, and most of his losses as a pro came when he was still getting his bearings.  His fight against Porter should have been a wide decision, as Ugas appeared to win that fight 9 rounds to 3.

It wasn’t close. Porter was afraid to mix it up from the first round after getting nailed by a hard right hand by Ugas. From that point on, Porter was running around the ring, trying to avoid getting poleaxed by one of Ugas’ right hands.

Pacquiao isn’t done

“Oh, man, he got upset. No kidding, I thought this was a dangerous fight,” said Kellerman on Pacquiao losing to a highly accomplished former amateur star in Ugas.

Manny Pacquiao is not done - says Max Kellerman

“By the way, since he [Ugas] lost that split decision to Shawn Porter that he could have easily won, he hasn’t lost since then. Ugas has won four straight.

“Now, Manny was asked if this is his last fight, and he said, ‘I don’t know. I need time to relax and make a decision.’ I doubt this is Manny’s last fight.

“He’s got too big a name, and he’s still effective and can still make too much money. I don’t know why his camp is against fighting Conor McGregor.

“If I was Manny and could pick up tens of millions of dollars fighting a guy that’s not really a boxer. He’s just a talented fighter who can also box way better than he aught in McGregor’s case. Why wouldn’t you want to do that.

“Do you want to get in with one of the welterweight killers for a fraction of the money? Alright, but Manny is a real fighter.

“The fight right before Ugas because of COVID was two years ago was Keith Thurman. Keith Thurman is a hell of a fighter and was undefeated at the time.

“Manny knocked him down in a war and won a close decision that I thought he deserved. Could Manny Pacquiao still beat a lot of good welterweights?

“Yeah, he can. I thought Spence was going to knock him out, but I thought he would have gone down in a great fight.

“Yeah, I doubt Pacquiao is done. He can still make too much money fighting, and I didn’t think it was so unpredictable that Ugas was going to beat him,” said Kellerman.

Pacquiao can still fight and likely best some of the top welterweights in the division, but probably not Errol Spence Jr. or Terence Crawford. It would be good for Pacquiao to leave Ugas alone and not attempt to avenge his loss.

Pacquiao would be inviting trouble in a second fight, and it would likely end badly for him, even if he had a full camp to prepare for the fight.

If Pacquiao wants to extend his career, he needs to drop back down to 140 or 135 where he’s not outsized so badly by the much bigger fighters.

Pacquiao would do well at lightweight, fighting guys like Vasily Lomachenko, Gervonta Davis, Ryan Garcia, and Devin Haney.

Manny wasn’t ready for Yordenis

“They dominated the local Golden Gloves in the local tournaments, but when they went to the national level, they couldn’t win that much and so on,” Kellerman said.

YouTube video

“There are levels in the pros, and it reflects largely, there’s a strong correlation to their amateur background. Ugas was an elite international amateur.

“He won a gold medal at the World Championships, and he won a bronze in the Olympics. This was at an elite level. He was not the most dominant elite amateur, but he was a successful one at the elite level.

“So, the Cuban school of boxing, and he’s successful at the elite amateur level, medaling in the Olympics. Then as a pro, not long ago, a lot of people thought he beat Shawn Porter.

“Shawn Porter is a great fighter. Well, he’s very good but not great. I think Shawn Porter is going to wind up in the Hall of Fame one day.

“He’s a tough guy to beat, and he got the decision against Ugas. It was a split decision. A lot of people thought Ugas won. So that guy is fighting Manny Pacquiao.

“Pacquiao, by the way, was training for Errol Spence, a very different type of guy. He’s an aggressive southpaw and very different from Ugas.

“Pacquiao is 42, hadn’t fought in two years, and had been in wars with the following fighters:

  • Marco Antonio Barrera, Hall of Famer. He fought him twice
  • Erik Morales, Hall of Famer. He fought him three times
  • Juan Manuel Marquez, Hall of Famer. These are guys that are either in the Hall of Fame or going. He fought him four times.
  • Tim Bradley. He fought him three times
  • Floyd Mayweather
  • Miguel Cotto, when he was great, still
  • Oscar De La Hoya, who was at the end of his career but still pretty effective
  • Shane Mosley

“He’s [Pacquiao] had over 70 fights and been through wars with the who’s who in the last 15 years. HIe started at flyweight, not at welterweight like these guys. Flyweight is 112 lbs.

“It’s not just that he started at flyweight. He won his first world title at flyweight and world championship at flyweight. Some guys say, ‘Well, he started at this lightweight weight class.

“Well, he wasn’t really facing quality competition. That was really lighter than he was. By the time he became a world-class fighter, he was three divisions over that.’

“No, Pacquiao was the lineal champion of the world as a flyweight, and then he moved up.

“Think of how many divisions. He didn’t stop in all these divisions, but many of them he won belts in, and a few of them he was actually ‘The guy, the champion’ in.

“These are all divisions on their way to junior middle, which is as big as he got.

  • Flyweight – 112
  • Junior bantamweight 115
  • Bantamweight – 118
  • Featherweight – 126
  • Junior lightweight – 130
  • Lightweight – 135
  • Junior welterweight – 140
  • Welterweight – 147
  • Junior middleweight – 154

“That’s nine weight classes above what he won his first world title,” Kellerman continued.

“So over 70 fights against whos who, he’s been through the wars, and hasn’t fought in two years fighting a last-minute substitute [Ugas] that is the opposite of the guy he was training for, who is really good, Ugas,” said Kellerman.

It was a foolishly insane idea on Manny Pacquiao’s part to agree to fight a guy as talented as Yordenis Ugas on less than two weeks’ notice after Errol Spence Jr. pulled out of the fight due to an eye injury.

Pacquiao was either naive or incredibly overconfident to take this fight with Ugas on short notice.

If this was the Pacquiao from 2009, okay, it might have worked for him to take the match without a full eight weeks. But this is the 42-year-old Pacquiao, who had been sitting around for two solid years, not boxing, muscles atrophying, and just wasting away.

Let’s face it; Pacquiao had no business being in the ring with the talented former Cuban amateur star Ugas, and he paid a heavy price in losing.

YouTube video

28 thoughts on “Manny Pacquiao is not done – says Max Kellerman”

  1. Max blind as a bat Kellermen knows Manny Pacquiao is done, he is repeating what he’s told on a teleprompter. I would too if they paid me what he gets paid.
    Deontay Wilder can’t fight at all, he is skinny and twerks, the twerkanator. The absolute best heavyweight fighter of the year is the gypsy king fury. He had Deontay Wilder on the back foot with all his excuses. Those gloves weren’t loaded with metal, the padding wasn’t repositioned, Deontay Wilder wasn’t drugged.
    See how good I am? Give me a job saying things that just aren’t true. I am willing to practice but I won’t lie for you.
    Yordenis Ugas is here to stay. Some american boxers can challenge him but they will have to bring a sack lunch because Yordenis Ugas came prepared.

  2. Boxing is picking up. Yordenis Ugas is the man. This is much better than when Andy Ruiz and Anthony Joshua fought. Yordenis Ugas will not deteriorate, yordenis Ugas will improve,the is better already. Manny Pacquiao would be better off retired, yordenis Ugas may accidentally hurt what’s his name.

  3. Random tests means you test randomly, especially with someone who has failed before.

  4. Why hasn’t a testing randomly for steroids been done for fury? He has failed virtually every test for every fight. He is on all sorts of performance enhancing drugs right now.
    Are you criminals at least going to test fury before the fight , he will have ample opportunity to cycle but he is a drug addict and has to be high when he fights.
    Clumsy oafishness and baohoonery dictates that fury will absolutely for sure mess if up and fail his drug test again. Are you going to let him fight high again? Are you going to allow him to fight after failing the steroids test again?

  5. Putting metal loaded gloves padding removal and steroid use together like you enabled Tyson to do in attempted homicide.

  6. Yordenis Ugas is a better boxer than Manny Pacquiao. He is going to beat him up again but worst this time, fortunately Manny Pacquiao will be well compensated, and Yordenis Ugas has a merciful mentality as long as you don’t do anything more to insult him any further. Yordenis Ugas is already pissed off as it is. This guy is going to kick your ass.

  7. If you don’t figure out a way to save your boys life like encourage, approved metal loaded gloves again so that the Shrek look a like ogre can defend himself or fake some sort of injury again, or something else, Tyson fury’s death will be your fault, the blood will be on your hands. While I loathe criminals like you, I what you all to live so that you will suffer.
    May god damn you all to the darkest recesses of hell where you will spend eternity tormented by the evil demons that reside there.

  8. Incentivised corruption richly rewarded exemplifies the spirit and mind of the business of professional boxing.
    Fighter who don’t fight, can’t even competently execute compound combination punching drills, abstinent, gone from Deontay Wilder fights obviously overtly audatiously conclusively cheated in both cases and not only did you criminals perpetrate the crimes but you thought it was funny and had a lot of fun commiting crimes. And didn’t do a lick of time. Actually rewarding criminals with fighter of the year and such things.
    Now you Winnie’s, find a way out of this one, because tyson can’t fight, Deontay Wilders going to kill that fraudulent, interloping, intruder.

  9. It’s over, it’s just not Manny Pacquiao and fury’s time. Please disperse calmly towards the nearest exit. Remain calm , it was good while it lasted. Those were the good old days.

  10. Tyson is not afraid of Deontay Wilder, neither is Dillian Whyte and Anthony Joshua hasn’t fought Deontay Wilder either. It’s not out of fear perse, it’s a precautionary measure. If fury, Whyte, and Anthony Joshua don’t fight Deontay Wilder, it would be impossible to lose to Deontay Wilder.

  11. John fury said,” Manny Pacquiao is done, stick a fork in him, he’s just like my son, he should have tossed the belt in the bin, I talked to him on the phone, but who am I ?”

  12. Yordenis Ugas only had two weeks to train for this fight and defeated the former champion who was intensely training for the lightning quick Spence.
    Yordenis Ugas Said he will give the other guy a rematch unlike Tyson chicken 🐓 cheating tactics again and again and again and again said,” I cheated in both cases with Deontay Wilder and I will never fight him because he is angry and he will beat me up easily. ” ” Deontay Wilder will beat me up badly and I will be there on the canvas with blood from the cut Otto Vallin dotted on my eye when he crossed my T. “

  13. Manny Pacquiao was quoted as saying,” the better Man won, I never trained harder for a fight, no excuses, Yordenis Ugas was too big, too young, too strong for me. “

  14. No question about it, there were no floppy gloves flopping around all over the place, there were no allogations of metal loaded gloves padding removal and steroid use the man won in a clean fight, in the middle of the ring. What a champion and what a man. Yordenis Ugas, let the legend begin.

  15. Awh you may as well give up. Ugas is here to stay. It will take a top american fighter to remove Yordenis from the duly elected office as número uno, the king of the hill, the head honcho the guys got class and style. The man can wear some clothes. Yordenis Ugas loves his mother.

  16. I would be suntanning on Miami beaches talking about,” más limonada por favor.” If I were Ugas. Sunglasses and all.
    Knowing those cuban boxers, he is probably training as usual. Not missing a beat.

  17. Wha t a great champion Yordenis has been transformed into, what a latent metamorphosis we have been privileged to whitniss before our very eyes.
    Is this the changing of the guard? Does this signal the usurping of all champions across the board except for Deontay Wilder? Has the takeover begun?

  18. Ugas wasn’t contractually obligated to rematch what’s his face was he? Ugas should run around all over the world crowing from the rooftops about being the champion. But no, he wants to fight the best.

  19. Ugas made it. Preparation meets opportunity. These cuban boxing programs are effective, now you see why Luis king Kong Ortiz hasn’t been given a chance to fight for the title except by the best heavyweight champion that ever lived without question, Deontay Wilder. Luis Ortiz will do the same if not worst to Whyte, Anthony Joshua and fury. Those phoney baloney fancy pants fake belt holders fear Luis. They avoided Luis Ortiz coming up with excuses after excuses after excuses not to fight Deontay Wilder or Luis Ortiz. All they do is talk talk talk talk talk, but no contract and now no fight.

  20. There’s been rumors of drugged fighters from Deontay Wilder, to Anthony Joshua and now Manny Pacquiao. If Manny Pacquiao wasn’t drugged, he should consider retirement soon.

  21. Max is a pandering sycaphant for compensation and like Manny Pacquiao must move on to a different chapter in gods plan for the world. Mr. Kellermen has enough money to live comfortably for the rest of his life, he has his health, youthfulness and is a man blessed with unique charismatic talents. Let these men go forward as positive instruments in the uplifting of the unfolding of gods plan. And may god curse the evil influences that attempt demarcating them from their ultimate devine purpose and blessings.

  22. As usual Max blind as a bat Kellermen is the spokesman for the exploitive influences that are destroying nature itself. Manny Pacquiao is a natural resource for his nation, placed by God, at this time to better this world. His time as a warrior is over, it is time for a different chapter in his life. No one is in a position to do good for his county and the world like Senator Manny Pacquiao, should he go the route of Mohamed Ali and cause damage to clarity of thought just to have one fight too many it would be a misuse of talent.

Comments are closed.