Pacquiao vs. Marquez 3 Results: Did the World Witness a Boxing Conspiracy?

All Juan Manuel Marquez wanted from his third and final match with defending WBO Welterweight champion Manny Pacquiao was a fair shake from the judges.

He did.

While many are calling this a controversial win, there is never a doubt that a fight close to a draw will almost always go to the defending champion.

If Marquez didn’t like the way things went in the last two fights, he should have made it so that the judges had nothing to do with the decision.

Marquez should have attacked Manny much harder than he did, but he was constantly punching as he was shuffling backwards.

While he landed enough shots to make the decision close enough to be controversial, people can’t say that he did any more than Pacquiao did in the fight.

Pac-Man did not dominate Marquez like I had anticipated, and it was the educated game plan of JMM that allowed him even to remain in the fight with the champion.

Marquez used the same technique that Erik Morales used six years ago to defeat Pacquiao: using the jab and straight right to keep Pac-Man from charging in and then stepping away.

With JMM keeping Manny off balance for much of the fight, he was never able to get the rhythm down needed to beat Marquez convincingly.

While this fight was close, it will take a decisive victory for the challenger to steal the belt, and that’s not what we had last night.

Boxing “fans” who just show up when a big name is fighting may not like the decision, but anyone who really cares about the sport saw this decision coming a mile away.

This trilogy is officially over, but if these two men were to ask for another rematch, I would love to see that fight.

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