Pacquiao says there’s a big possibility” he fights Mayweather in 2019

Pacquiao says there’s a big possibility” he fights Mayweather in 2019

Pacquiao says there’s a big possibility” he fights Mayweather in 2019

Pacquiao says there’s a big possibility” he fights Mayweather in 2019

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Manny Pacquiao (60-7-2, 39 KOs) is confident that he’ll be facing Floyd Mayweather Jr. in 2019 in a rematch of their 2015 fight. Mayweather (50-0, 27 KOs) has already mentioned wanting to fight Pacquiao.

Mayweather first needs to get his December 31 fight out of the way against Japanese kickboxer Tenshin Nasukawa in their New Years Eve fight in Japan. Pacquiao will be fighting next against Adrien Broner in January on Showtime. There’s a good chance Mayweather and Pacquiao will win their fights.

Pacquiao, 39, has been waiting for a chance to avenge his loss to Mayweather for the last three years, and he can’t wait to get him inside the ring to get even with him. Pacquiao had a shoulder injury when he fought Mayweather, and he was less than 100 percent when they squared off in 2015. The injury has been taken care of with surgery back in 2015, and Pacquiao is looking better than ever.

Pacquiao’s last performance was an impressive 7th round knockout win over WBA ‘regular’ welterweight champion Lucas Matthysse earlier this year on July 15 at the Axiata Arena, Kuala Lumpur, in Maylaysia. The performance was easily the best by Pacquiao since his victory over Oscar De La Hoya in 2008. Pacquiao scored his first knockout in nine years since his 12th round knockout win over Miguel Cotto in 2009. Pacquiao looked a lot better against Matthysse than he did in the Cotto fight. Everything Pacquiao hit Matthysse with hurt him. It was a Pacquiao that boxing fans hadn’t seen for ages.

“There’s a big possibility because Floyd is coming back into boxing,”Pacquiao said to skysports.com. “He is fighting in December and I am fighting in January. So a big possibility after that next year, that we will discuss a re-match.”

Mayweather, 41, hasn’t said who he wants to fight in 2019 if he gets passed his December 31 opponent Tenshin Nasukawa in Japan. The door seems to have been closed for Mayweather in his ability to handpick the UFC fighters to beat in boxing matches. UFC president Dana White seemingly closed the door on Mayweather to fight UFC fighters when told the media that he can’t fight UFC champion Khabib Nurmagomedov in a boxing match. One would assume that White feels the same way about UFC fighter Conor McGregor, who Mayweather beat last year in August 2017 in a fight that brought in massive numbers in PPV and ticket sales. A rematch between Mayweather and McGregor cold likely give Floyd another nine-figure payday.

“My thinking is to have a re-match and to make a clear decision on who will win the fight because in the last fight that we had it wasn’t clear who won the fight because he didn’t throw a lot of punches and he won the fight,” Pacquiao said.

Mayweather has slowed down a lot in the hand speed department, and he could very well lose to Pacquiao in the rematch. Pacquiao had problems getting to Mayweather in the early rounds. Pacquiao backed off a little after he was caught a number of times by hard right hands from Mayweather. However, in the later rounds, Pacquiao fought well, and he made close despite fighting with an injured shoulder. Pacquiao’s power and speed that he showed against Matthysse would present a big problem for Mayweather if the two of them were to face each other in 2019.

Mayweather is Pacquiao’s best option for a huge payday in the sport right now. Unless Pacquiao starts combing through the MMA ranks looking for big paydays the way Mayweather is doing now, his best option for a big money fight is a rematch with Floyd. For that fight to make both guys money, Mayweather and Pacquiao needs to win their next fights. Mayweather’s fight against Nasukawa on December 31 is rumored to be an exhibition fight under the rules of boxing. That hasn’t been officially confirmed. If it is a boxing match, then that’ll be an easy win for Mayweather, who would have a huge advantage over Nasukawa, who is a small fighter with limited boxing skills. Nasukawa does have fast hands and respectable power on his shots, but he fights in the 126 weight class, and he’s going to be over his head against Mayweather. It would be the same if Mayweather was asked to fight someone with a big weight advantage over him from the light heavyweight division like Artur Beterbiev, Dmitry Bivol or Adonis Stevenson. Even with Mayweather’s speed and boxing brilliance, he would be at risk at all times of getting hurt by those fighters with the shots they land. Pacquiao has some risk as well in his fight against former four division world champion Broner (33-3-1, 24 KOs). That’s going to be a tough fight for Pacquiao, due to Broner being young at 29, and having a strong chin. Broner has never been knocked out before during his 10 year pro career, and he’s been inside the ring with some powerful punchers like Marcos Maidana, Adrian Granados, John Molina Jr., Shawn Porter, Antonio DeMarco and Daniel Ponce De Leon.

Mayweather sounded disappointed when he spoke about the rematch with Pacquiao not taking place they had talked of wanting to meet in December. Mayweather said there was other plans for Pacquiao to fight after he signed with Al Haymon at Premier Boxing Champions. Suddenly after years of seemingly limited choices of opponents, Pacquiao has a lot of options in being signed with Haymon. Pacquiao can now fight the likes of Mayweather, Shawn Porter, Danny Garcia, Amir Khan, Keith Thurman, Adrien Broner and Errol Spence Jr. For the time being, Pacquiao will be taking the Broner fight. He’s having the most problems with his career recently with his 12 round draw against Jessie Vargas and loss to Mikey Garcia. Broner hasn’t won a fight in two years since beating Adrian Granados in 2016.

“I had a shoulder injury…but this time, if this re-match happens, there are no excuses, no alibis,” Pacquiao said.

Pacquiao needs to make sure he’s injury-free if he gets the rematch with Mayweather in 2019, as that’s the only shot he has of beating him. If Pacquiao is fighting with an injured limb, he’s not going to beat Mayweather, even with him staring to look old and fleshy. Pacquiao needs to be healthy for him to have a chance of beating him.

Out of all the top fighters in boxing, Pacquiao is probably the only one that Mayweather would consider a fight with at this point in his career. Mayweather has shown no interest in wanting to fight a rematch against Saul Canelo Alvarez, who he beat by a 12 round majority decision in 2013. A second fight between Mayweather and Canelo would make them both a massive amount of money. Mayweather doesn’t want the fight though. He also hasn’t shown interest in fighting the top welterweights Terence Crawford, Errol Spence, Danny Garcia or Shawn Porter. There’s a lot of money to be made for Mayweather in fighting those guys if he were willing to be involved in fights where there was a possibility of him losing. But at this point in Mayweather’s career, he seems to be risk averse, and more interested in taking fights that are a sure thing win. It wouldn’t be a sure thing for Mayweather if he fought Thurman, Spence, Crawford, Garcia or Porter.