NYDailyNews.com: Manny Pacquiao retained his WBO welterweight championship Saturday night with a lopsided, 12-round unanimous decision before a crowd of 50,994 in the first boxing match at Cowboys Stadium.
If Clottey’s goal was to finish on his feet and avoid the fate of Pacquiao’s last three opponents, who were KO’d or stopped via TKO, then his strategy worked. If he was intent on winning, then it was the absolute wrong tactic to take against the Filipino pound-for-pound king who likes to throw punches in bunches and relishes nothing more than knocking out his opponent.
There were no knockdowns in the fight and Clottey (35-4, 21 KOs) never appeared to be hurt by the wicked body assault that Pacquiao mounted for much of the bout. But his unwillingness to exchange or throw punches sapped some of the excitement from the crowd that was charged for the historic fight.
Judge Duane Ford scored it 120-108, a shutout for Pacquiao. Judges Levi Martinez and Nelson Vasquez each scored it 119-109, giving Clottey one round. It wasn’t that close.
“He was waiting for a big shot,” Pacquiao said. “He was looking to counter-punch me.”
When Clottey did decide to throw, he landed with accuracy and seemed to jolt Pacquiao with his powerful jab. In the second round, Clottey went all rubbery in the legs, pretending that he had been hurt by a shot from Pacquiao (51-3-2, 38 KOs).
Perhaps out of frustration, Pacquiao cuffed Clottey’s ears with his gloves in the third round and drew a smiling rebuke from referee Rafael Ramos. Even though Clottey was not throwing many punches, he had raised a mouse under Pacquiao’s right eye by the seventh round, a telling sign that those few punches had some sting.
The only target that Clottey gave Pacquiao was the body, and Pacquiao mounted a full-out assault by ripping shots to Clottey’s rib cage. It had to be wearing Clottey down, but he betrayed no signs of fatigue from the shots.
Between rounds, Lenny DeJesus, a last-minute replacement as Clottey’s trainer, kept telling the boxer he was losing every round and he needed to pick up his offense. But it fell on deaf ears as Clottey kept plodding around the ring with his gloves in front of his face, taking all the body shots that Pacquiao wanted to throw.
It was an unusual promotion from the start. A Filipino star fighting a boxer from Ghana deep in the heart of Texas. Typically the venue is merely a backdrop, but the $1.2 billion stadium took center stage with its 72-foot long high-def TV hanging over the ring to provide a more intimate view to most of the crowd, the biggest crowd in the U.S. for a fight since Julio Cesar Chavez fought Pernell Whitaker at the Alamodome in 1993. Among those in attendance were Jets owner Woody Johnson and GM Mike Tannenbaum. Maybe they were there to get a sneak peek at how a big stadium fight plays because promoter Bob Arum has proposed bringing a fight to the new Meadowlands football stadium in 2011.
It was a shame that Pacquiao wasn’t fighting Floyd Mayweather Jr. “I want that fight, the world wants that fight, but it’s up to him,” Pacquiao said. “I’m ready to fight any time.” Even without that kind of highly charged welterweight showdown, the air was crackling with excitement, though few gave Clottey more than a puncher’s chance.
