Pacquiao-Marquez 3: Who Really Won?

According to Manny Pacquiao, he clearly won.

According to Marquez, he was robbed, meaning he should have won.

According to the three Judges, err, two of the three judges, Manny Won. The third judge said nobody won, it was a draw!

So who really won?

Officially, in the record books, Manny Pacquiao did.

In Juan Manuel Marquez's book (and mind), he's won over Pacquiao three times already! Of course his fans, and many others including other boxers, scribes, and pundits read the same book.

On the other hand, it was so surprising to see many Manny Pacquiao fans expressing their own judgements that it was Marquez who won!

I think it's testament to the fact that the fight was so close. Analyzing how the judges scored the bout adds to this observation or contention: it was easy to fix the scoring in Manny's favor because Marquez didn't win very clearly! It's like, Marquez could have been declared the winner and Manny (and his camp, and diehard fans) will complain to high heavens he was robbed!

Looking at how professional boxing matches are scored, I can definitely say that Manny Pacquiao won. Just look at the four areas used in scoring fights:

1. Aggression. Manny was the aggressor almost all throughout the fight. By that I mean he was the stalker, he was aggressive (one can argue Marquez was aggressively defending himself :) while landing counter punches). Both Marquez and Pacquiao landed shots. According to stats, Pacquiao landed more. So even if Marquez felt that he landed the cleaner shots, it doesn't matter. Manny was the aggressive fighter who was able to land jabs and power shots too.

2. Defense. Both of them got hit cleanly, so both fighters' defense was not able to give them any advantage. In this category, it's a draw.

3. Ring generalship. Who controlled the tempo? Again, I scored a draw in this category. Both fighters were able to use their styles but were not able to control the fight with it. Marquez was able to neutralize Pacquiao's attack with accurate counter punches but he was not able to land more punches than the opponent. Pacquiao on the other hand was not able to land more telling blows while attacking. So it’s a draw in this category.

4. Clean and Hard Punching. Both fighters had their moments. In Marquez's mind, this is where he won the fight. But was it enough to win the fight? In my mind, no, he didn’t do enough.  I still scored it a draw in this category.

On this line of argument, I agree with the judges' verdict that Manny Pacquiao won. Yes he did win, but not in a very convincing manner. Which means this fight will continue to be discussed and argued for more years to come. Nuff said...