The day Pacquiao was deprived of victory
Credit to Author: EDDIE G. ALINEA| Date: Sat, 04 May 2019 16:26:20 +0000
May 8, 2004, was the day Filipino ring icon Manny Pacquiao first fought Mexican legend Juan Manuel Marquez .
The 12-round matchup, held at the MGM Grand Arena, was for Marquez’s WBA and IBF featherweight titles, resulted in a split decision draw, thus, depriving the now Philippine Senator of what could have been his fourth championship in three weight divisions.
Five years prior on Dec. 14, 1998, Pacquiao had crowned himself the WBC flyweight titlist following an 8th round knocking out of Thai title-defending Chatchai Sasakul.
Three years later, he, likewise, dethroned super bantamweight belt holder Lehlo Ledwawba, also via stoppage in six rounds on June 23, 2001, in his first fight on the US soil and first, too, under the tutelage of Hall of Famer-to-be Freddie Roach.
And a year before the Marquez 1 encounter, the Pacman, subdued another Mexican great Marco Antonio Barrera in TKO in 11 adding the RING 126-pound diadem to his fast growing collection.
It wasn’t surprising, therefore, that our own Manny would be tagged favorite in that Marquez 1 showdown between two of the world’s most popular fighters.
The soon-to-be “Fighter of the Decade” honoree of the Boxing Writers Association of America readily showed his worth before then still doubting boxing world by catching Marquez cold, dropping him to the canvas three times right in the opening bell.
The Mexican, however, showed great fighting heart to recover from that nearly knockdowns and went on to emerge the winner in the majority of the rounds hence largely on account of his effective counterpunching.
At the end of the close encounter, both combatants expressed belief they had done enough to win. The bout ended in a controversial draw. Final scores submitted by the three judges saw one awarding victory to Marquez, 115-110, the same scorecard given by another showing Pacquiao the victor.
The third judge scored it even 113-113. That judge admitted later, though, having erred scoring the first round at 10-7 for Pacquiao instead of standard 10-6, as the two other judges did, on three knockdown round .
Had the judge , who saw the first round Pacquaio the winner, 10-7, instead of 10-6 on the way to an even 113-113, Pacquiao would have been a split decision winner and declared the new WBA and IBF featherweight champ.
Four years later on March 15, 2008, Pacquiao bounced back and avenged his 2004 frustration by scoring a 12-round decision over Marquez in their second meeting to strip the Mexican of his WBC super-featherweight plum.
Pacquiao even extended his luck by annexing, too, the WBC lightweight crown at the expense of David Diaz (TKO in 9), IBO/Ring junior welterweight over Ricky Hatton (KO in 2), WBO welterweight against Miguel Cotto (TKO in 12), and WBC super-welterweight over Antonio Margarito (12 round decision).
He did that in the span of mere two years until 2008 to become the only man on planet Earth to be crowned world champion in eight weight divisions.
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