ALL OVER IN 6
LAST-SECOND MARQUEZ SHOT KOS PACQUIAO
LAS VEGAS — Mexico’s Juan Manuel Marquez knocked Manny Pacquiao out cold with a vicious right hook to the chin at the last second before the end of the sixth round Saturday, putting a sudden end to the fourth fight between the two boxers.
Marquez earlier dropped Pacquiao, also with a right, in the third round but the Filipino knocked the Mexican down in the fifth to level the count. The two then furiously exchanged heavy blows right up to the sixth round when Marquez threw the right that Pacquiao never saw coming, dropping him like a log face first to the canvas at 2:59 of the sixth round.
Referee Kenny Bayless, who had previously officiated two of Pacquiao’s fights and one of Marquez’s, waved the fight to an end as the Mexican clambered up the ropes to celebrate as his fans erupted in jubilation while the Filipinos in the crowd stood and sat in silent shock.
Pacquiao was down for about two minutes before his handlers managed to get him up. After being helped to his corner, he sat on a stool, blew his nose and stared vacantly ahead as his gloves were being removed. His wife Jinkee was seen weeping outside his corner.
Pacquiao was later taken to the hospital after the fight for mandatory checks.
Pacquiao was actually ahead, 47-46, on all three scorecards after the fifth round. He was also ahead on ringside punching stats, which showed him landing 94 of 256 punches thrown as against the 52 that Marquez landed of 246 thrown.
But it was the one big right hand from Marquez that counted more than anything, knocking Pacquiao out for the first time in 13 years and only the third time in a career spanning 17.
“I got hit by a punch I didn’t see,” Pacquiao later said.
Pacquiao’s trainer Freddie Roach agreed. “He was in charge. He just got a little too careless and got hit with a punch he didn’t see,” Roach said.
Interviewed after the fight, Marquez explained his victory: “I threw a perfect punch. I knew Manny could knock me out at any time. I felt he was coming to knock me out the last three rounds and I knew he was going to be wide open.”
Marquez had vowed to finally beat Pacquiao after losing two close fights and settling for a draw in the first fight.
“I was going to retire last year. Now I feel great that I leave no doubt in the way I got this victory over Manny,” Marquez said. “I was counterpunching him. I got under his guard, threw the right hand when he tried to punch me.”
After decking Pacquiao in the third, Marquez himself got floored in the fifth, and with the Filipino landing big left hands, it looked like it would be Pacquiao’s night after all.
As the two came out for the sixth round, the pace turned relentless and both fighters were brawling when suddenly, just before the bell, Marquez, regarded as one of the world’s best counterpunchers, correctly read Pacquiao’s round- ending attack and deftly sidestepped a one-two combination to let loose a jaw-cracking right.
Pacquiao crumpled to the canvas in a heap, his body seen to unconsciously twitch.
It was the second loss in a row for Pacquiao, who dropped a contentious decision to Timothy Bradley in June. He nevertheless stood to earn at least a $20 million purse plus shares in the payper-view.
Promoter Bob Arum immediately said he could see a fifth fight between the two boxers, and a dazed Pacquiao seemed to agree. “Why not?” he said. Pacquiao said he would like to fight Marquez again. “I am going to rest and come back to fight. I would go for a fifth,” he said.
Aside from the widely discredited Bradley decision, this was the first real loss by Pacquiao since 2005 when he lost a unanimous decision to Erik Morales.
Pacquiao, who was a three-to-one favorite on Friday, dropped to 54-5-2 with 38 knockouts. Pacquiao weighed in at the division’s 147-pound limit (66.67kg) while Marquez, who improved to 55-6-1 with 40 knockouts, came in at 143 pounds (64.86kg).
The fighters had set a blistering pace, making it look unlikely for the fight to go the distance the way their three previous fights had.
Pacquiao was eager to redeem himself after the controversial Bradley loss. He was also tired of Marquez blaming biased judging for his failure to win in their three previous fights.
Pacquiao came out attacking from the opening bell. By the time the sixth round started, Marquez looked a bloody mess, bleeding from a cut over his nose and from the mouth. But as Roach had said, Pacquiao “got a little too careless.” And carelessness is precisely what a great counterpuncher like Marquez waits to feed on.