The Complicated Legacy of Manny Pacquiao: How Does He Stack Up All-Time?

For 12 rounds, it looked like the old Manny Pacquiao was back. The Filipino great was a blur of ferocity, pursuing opponent Chris Algieri around the ring in Macau, China, like a man with a desperate desire to prove something—and to please an audience that had begun to doubt his once superior powers.

Was the dominant win—one HBO announcer, Max Kellerman, called it "historically lopsided"—a return to form? Or was Algieri, an enormous underdog before the first bell rang, simply a human punching bag tossed into the ring for the purpose of making fans, and perhaps Pacquiao himself, believe once again?

Both could be true. Or neither could be.

What's undeniable, as his 36th birthday approaches, is the fact that Pacquiao's 64 professional fights have left a legacy worth exploring. While far from done, he's certainly approaching the finish line. And though we often explore rival Floyd Mayweather Jr.'s position among the greats, Manny rarely gets the same treatment. 

Parsing a fighter's place in boxing history is a complicated business. For one, today's fighters don't compete nearly as often as their predecessors. Additionally, for all its current corruption, boxing's past is littered with enough mob involvement to make every bout suspect. Changes in training methodology and improved athletic performance across the board, too, make it hard to compare fighters across eras.

For a fighter of Pacquiao's obvious prowess, however, it's worth making the effort. 

First, and perhaps foremost among his many achievements, is Pacquiao's march through boxing's lighter-weight classes. Over more than a decade, and more than 39 pounds, he's demolished many of the best fighters in the world in all shapes and sizes. Starting with the flyweight class in 1998, he's systematically conquered eight different divisions, ending up as the WBC light middleweight champion after beating Antonio Margarito in 2010. 

Weight Class	Opponent	Date
Flyweight	Chatchai Sasakul	12/4/98
Super Bantamweight	Lehlo Ledwaba	6/23/01
Featherweight	Marco Antonio Barrera	11/15/03
Super Featherweight	Juan Manuel Marquez	3/15/08
Lightweight	David Diaz	6/28/08
Light Welterweight	Ricky Hatton	5/2/09
Welterweight	Miguel Cotto	11/14/09
Light Middleweight	Antonio Margarito	11/13/2010

In the annals of boxing history, perhaps only Roberto Duran truly compares. Like Pacquiao, Duran was a tiny bundle of aggression, often towered over by his opponents. Undeterred, he rarely took a step backward no matter how undersized or outgunned.

The dominant champion at lightweight for seven years, the Panamanian wrecking ball stepped up to welterweight to dethrone the great "Sugar" Ray Leonard. Title wins at junior middleweight and finally middleweight culminated in his journey to Canastota and the International Boxing Hall of Fame.

Of course, in today's boxing landscape, simply winning a title isn't necessarily a sign of true excellence. Championships abound in each weight class—it's about whom you beat more than it's about hardware. And here, at least among his peers, Pacquiao shines.

Three of his wins came at the expense of clear Hall of Famers in their fighting primes—Erik Morales, Marco Antonio Barrera and Juan Manuel Marquez. He caught all-time greats Oscar De La Hoya and Shane Mosley at the end of their careers, and the rest of his resume is dotted with a number of very good fighters, including Miguel Cotto, Ricky Hatton, Margarito and Timothy Bradley.

The name missing from the list, unfortunately, is the one that matters most.

Few question that Pacquiao and Mayweather are the best fighters of their era. They've walked the same path for a decade, fighting many of the same opponents, each laying claim to the mantle of pound-for-pound kingpin.

What they've never managed to do, despite public demand that would have undoubtedly made the bout the most profitable and lucrative in boxing history, is step in the ring together. It's a monumental failure for the fighters and the boxing establishment alike, one that will stain both men's legacies forever.

Great fighters prove themselves in the ring against other legends. That's how mettle is tested and how primacy, rightfully, should be determined. Sure, you have to compare greats across generations with rhetoric and bombast. Henry Armstrong and Leonard, for example, were separated by decades. A potential showdown between the two can only be contested in the fertile arena of our imaginations.

In the same era, however, any doubts about who stands alone at the top of the ladder can be settled with flying fists and dancing feet. Pacquiao and Mayweather have yet to find the courage to truly settle who's the better man. It's a failing that boxing historian Dougie Fischer, who compiled a list of the 20 best fighters of the modern era for Ring Magazine, says cost both when compared to their historical forebears:

"

Mayweather and Pacquiao dropped the ball big time with this one, and it cost them both in my final analysis. Even Jones, who is rightfully criticized for cherry picking opponents during his prime years, fought James Toney when Lights Out was considered the best super middleweight in the game and was near the top of most pound-for-pound rankings.

"

Once again, as they always do immediately following one of their fights, rumors are swirling about a Mayweather-Pacquiao showdown. And while it wouldn't be quite the defining moment it might have been in 2010, it's still a fight that would break every box-office record and decide the argument once and for all.

Yes, both men have declined since those halcyon days. But they've declined together. Stylistically, it's still the same delightful match, boxing's best defensive fighter against its most effectively aggressive. And it's still a bout that will define both men's careers by its absence, saying more about Pacquiao and Mayweather than 100 wins over the Algieris and Victor Ortizes of the world. 

Manny Pacquiao and Floyd Mayweather need each other. Boxing needs them. The time is now or never. Until the two finally square off, their Hall of Fame careers can only receive one grade—incomplete.