Ranking the Best Opponents for Manny Pacquiao's Next Fight
And just like that, Manny Pacquiao is a big name in boxing again.
OK, the reality is the Filipino superstar never went away in spite of a would-be April retirement that wound up numbering in days and weeks rather than months and years.
An announcement was made in July that he’d be coming back for more, and the night of nights finally arrived on Saturday in Las Vegas, where the 37-year-old was simply too much for once-beaten Jessie Vargas on the way to a victory by unanimous decision at the Thomas & Mack Center.
The victory was Pacquiao’s 59th in a career that dates back to January 1995—when Vargas was 5 years old—and put him atop the WBO’s welterweight heap for the third time since 2009.
His initial 147-pound reign ended after three defenses with a loss to Timothy Bradley in 2012, and his second was cut short following one defense in a superfight with Floyd Mayweather Jr. in 2015.
He convincingly beat Bradley in their non-title third go-round in April, then announced to a generally disbelieving world he’d decided to walk away. Trainer Freddie Roach, promoter Bob Arum and Bradley himself didn't suggest an exit was necessary—thanks to the quality he’d shown that night—and the "comeback" bout against Vargas once again validated their contentions.
The majority of the Vargas run-up focused on Pacquiao’s future plans anyway, so we’ll take that ball and continue to run with it here—conceding that some options are more likely than others given the chronically illogical ways in which fights these days are (or aren't) made.
Got some other ideas? Feel free to fire away in the comments section.
5. Kell Brook
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It’s not too often that a fifth-round loss raises a fighter’s stock.
But given the ambition Kell Brook showed in reaching for middleweight monster Gennady Golovkin, and the guts he displayed before finally succumbing, it’s no stretch to suggest he deserves a reward.
Oh, and he might still be the best welterweight in the world too.
And now that Pacquiao has a WBO title belt, the dynamic Briton wants a chance to prove it.
"I'm ready to do it again,” Brook told ESPN (via Nick Howson of the International Business Times). "I'm after the biggest and best fights out there. Those are the ones that are going to get me up for it. Once you have become world champion, you need special fights to really keep you motivated in training. A world title unification fight would do that."
Brook’s quest, however, begins with two strikes against it.
First, he’s not as recognizable as some of his stateside contemporaries at 147.
And second, that fact—along with his obvious talent—makes him the sort of high-risk, low-reward proposition promoters tend to avoid.
4. Danny Garcia/Keith Thurman
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When it comes to Pacquiao, a Mayweather rematch is clearly the fight most ticket-sellers would want. But if there's a welterweight option coming up fast on the outside, it could be the winner of the planned springtime go-round between unbeaten claimants Danny Garcia and Keith Thurman.
No fighter at 140 pounds did more than Garcia from 2012 to 2014, and now he’s galloped into the 147-pound world and lassoed a title belt, he makes a lot of sense.
He rode sidesaddle on Mayweather's pay-per-view show with Canelo Alvarez in 2013 and handled the spotlight well, and he's got a talkative father who'd no doubt love to get the full-on complement of 24/7 microphones that'd presumably accompany an HBO broadcast with the Filipino.
Thurman, meanwhile, began building his own welterweight brand in the Mayweather shadow, then stepped on to the top-tier championship stage with a thrilling defeat of Shawn Porter in June.
His WBA belt would be up against Garcia’s WBC strap if their late-winter bout comes off, and it’s not hard to imagine Pacquiao getting revved up for the winner come next summer.
If you're a fan of both boxing and Santa Claus, this is the fight to scribble on to your 2017 wishlist.
3. Terence Crawford
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Hold the tips of your index finger and thumb about an inch apart.
That’s about how close Terence Crawford came to landing what would have been the biggest fish of his nearly eight-year pro career.
Pacquiao would have played that role had he agreed to meet the Nebraska native—and not repeat foil Bradley—in his pseudo swansong. But if Pac-Man wakes up in a fighting mood once again after handling Vargas with such alacrity, perhaps he’ll reconsider the option.
Promoter Bob Arum started making statements about Crawford and Pacquiao a while back—the way he used to do about Brandon Rios when Bam Bam was an unbeaten lightweight champion.
"Down the road—and it's very possible—that a year from now we put him in with Pacquiao," the Top Rank boss told BoxingScene.com after Crawford ripped Yuriorkis Gamboa.
"That would be a huge fight and a great fight," Arum continued. "If you really think you have a great fighter with superstar qualities, you move him that way. You don't protect him. You move a superstar into the biggest fights you can make for him, and that's what we are going to do.”
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2. Canelo Alvarez
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It's simple math.
Take Mayweather's foil in one of the biggest-grossing pay-per-views of all time, add a guy who met Money in the biggest show ever in 2015, and you'd probably draw some eyeballs.
At the very least, Canelo Alvarez is an ideal opponent for a marquee career continuation.
Now he’s ditched the middleweight belt for smaller quarry at 154, and presuming he still doesn't fancy the idea of Golovkin, Pacquiao might be there for the asking.
Alvarez's promoter, Oscar De La Hoya, had expressed interest in a Pacquiao match in the past. And chances are good that if Pacquiao gave the word—even though the company line has suggested the train has left the station, according to Carlos Boogs for BoxingScene.com—it wouldn't be hard to fire it up once again.
Given the fan reaction when it’s been brought up in the past, at least a few people would like to see it.
1. Floyd Mayweather Jr.
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The reason it made sense for Mayweather and Pacquiao to finally meet in May 2015 hasn’t changed.
No matter where they go and no matter what they say, neither one of them would ever make as much money fighting anyone else as he would by fighting the other.
And regardless of the backlash following their $100 competitive yawner and so many people’s insistence they wouldn't be fooled again, the idea Mayweather vs. Pacquiao II would not draw a full house in Las Vegas and at least a million or two more via pay-per-view is self-righteous naivety.
Some people believe Pacquiao was genuinely hampered by the shoulder injury he said he aggravated in the early going, per Ben Dirs of BBC Sport. And the subsequent report by SB Nation's Thomas Hauser that Mayweather received a dubious IV the night before the fight no doubt has others thinking that, without the saline and vitamins, who knows?
Couple those concepts with the reality that both men still possess the rare mixture of mainstream profile and pound-for-pound stardom, and it’d almost be more surprising if Mayweather didn't call on his Filipino foil to go for 50-0 than if he did.
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