De La Hoya can't answer bell for 8th round
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Manny Pacquiao, left, lands a left to the head of Oscar De La
Hoya during the their welterweight fight on Saturday night.
AP |

updated 12:00 a.m. ET Dec.
7, 2008
LAS VEGAS - The end for Oscar De La Hoya on
this night came as he sat in the corner after the eighth round, his left
eye swollen shut and his face bruised by punches Manny Pacquiao seemed
able to land almost at will. The decision to call it a night was
easy.
Pacquiao gave De La
Hoya a lot to think about by beating and battering him around the ring
for eight rounds Saturday night before De La Hoya declined to answer the
bell for the ninth round. The domination was shocking enough, but the
fact that it came at the hands of a fighter who just nine months earlier
had been fighting at 129 pounds had to be even more troubling for De La
Hoya and his legions of fans.
De La Hoya absorbed
such a beating that he was taken to a hospital afterwards for what was
described as a precautionary examination. The most popular fighter of
his generation won just one round on one ringside scorecard and none on
the other two against a smaller opponent who fought bigger than him from
the opening bell on.
“We knew we had him
after the first round,” Pacquiao trainer Freddie Roach said.
He certainly had
nothing against Pacquiao, who fought a lot bigger than he looked and who
proved that speed was a lot more important than size.
“That’s what we were
focused on every day in the gym, speed, speed would be the key to this
fight,” Pacquiao said. “I trained hard for this fight, and that’s why I
deserve tonight.”
It was lopsided from
the beginning, with Pacquiao landing punch after punch while De La Hoya
chased after him, trying to catch him with a big blow. Pacquiao was
winning big even before the seventh round, when he was pounding De La
Hoya against the ropes in his corner and catching him with huge shots
that knocked him across the ring.
Pacquiao (48-3-2, 36
knockouts) came up two weight classes to fight for his biggest purse
ever, while De La Hoya dropped down to meet him at 147 pounds. Though De
La Hoya (39-6) towered over Pacquiao and had a big reach advantage over
him, Pacquiao had no trouble getting inside what few jabs De La Hoya
threw to land his shots.
Pacquiao was credited
with landing 224 of 585 punches to just 83 of 402 for De La Hoya.
Pacquiao will earn a
guaranteed $11 million.
"We'd like to believe that in some
small way, our Quantum (Scalar Energy) Products Helped Manny Win this fight." John
Dalzell - Dec '08 |