Manny Pacquiao: Pac-Man Unworthy of "Godfather" Title

Manny Pacquiao means a lot to boxing and to his home country of the Philippines. However, in Newsweek’s latest publication, calling the boxer “The Godfather” is going way to far. 

Yes, Pacquiao is the biggest star to come out of the country. He has built a hospital, has a game show Manny Many Prizes and tries to take as much time as he can with his fellow countrymen. 

“To call Manny Pacquiao a boxer is one of those descriptions that don’t quite fly, like calling Mahatma Gandhi a Hindu lawyer,” Lawrence Osborne wrote in the Newsweek piece that is coming out.

However, calling someone a “Godfather” means that they are the biggest thing in every aspect of their life. Sure, Manny rules the world in the Philippines, but in his boxing world, he is nowhere near the “Godfather” of the sport. 

That title is held by the man everyone wants to see him fight, Floyd Mayweather.

Pacquiao isn’t the biggest drawing boxer in the sport today. That distinct honor goes to “Pretty Boy" Floyd Mayweather. 

Mayweather’s last fight against Victor Ortiz had $1.25 million pay-per-view buys, that generated $78.44 million. In fact, not only was that Mayweather’s third consecutive fight that had over one million pay-per-view buys, but it was the third-biggest non-heavyweight drawing fight. 

There were speculation that Pacquiao’s fight against “Sugar” Shane Mosley had the same numbers as Mayweather’s ’07 fight against Oscar De La Hoya, but there were never any showing of the numbers. 

In his fight coming up next week against Juan Manuel Marquez, it will be a pay-per-view that will have a lot of buys, but it will not have people talking about the fight more than two days after the event, like the way people talk about Mayweather’s fight. 

After Floyd’s last bout against Victor Ortiz, people were talking about the fight weeks after the bout was over. The fight had a lot of story lines coming from it, such as, “Did Floyd hit a cheap shot?” And there was the post-fight interview that had everyone talking.

Pacquiao will be a great boxer that will be talked about with the greatest. However, he will never be ahead of Mayweather because Floyd owns the sport of boxing right now, as the best person to watch and the person who currently controls the sport. 

What happens if Manny loses against Marquez? He will still be beloved in his country, but in the boxing world, it will hurt his drawing power, which is already well behind “Money" Mayweather’s.

Manny can continue to plan for running for Governor in his country in 2013 and then Senator in 2016, while making commercials to sell his singing and HP TouchPad. 

Calling Manny Pacquiao a “Godfather” in his country is one thing, however, he is not the “Godfather” of his sport; that distinction goes to Floyd Mayweather, who is not giving that title up anytime soon. 

Follow @tjmcaloon