Pacquiao-Marquez III. A win is a win

A win is a win but this one is disappointing.

I watched the Pacquiao-Marquez III fight at an SM Cinema. I was not feeling very well this weekend but I mustered enough strength to watch what every Filipino will be following too. As if a foreboding of things to come, the first fight in the undercard was boring and the satellite signal was jittery. This is not turning out right, I thought.

Then the main event started. The two fighters were tentative. It is as if after 24 previous rounds, both are still feeling out each other. The first quarter of the fight were like sparring rounds. Neither one would take it to the other. This is perfect for Marquez, I thought.

Marquez clearly had the blueprint on how to beat Pacquiao. He may have just exposed how to fight a swarming Manny. Crouch low, stick out your hands, stay out, and counter punch at will. Fight in spurts, don't tee up, limit toe-to-toe exchanges. Unlike against the taller fighters he fought before, Manny was punching low, not up. Bradley might learn a lot from this.

While the two seemed to exchanged toe-to-toe, with Pacquiao's superior hand speed, he seem to unleash more punches, but Marquez landed the cleaner, more accurate ones. The judges must have been impressed by the greater number of punches. If they had the benefit of slow motion replay, they will see that many of Manny's  punches landed on air.

By the fourth round, I slowly sank to my chair anticipating an unthinkable Pacquiao loss. What if?

I felt sick again. The sickening feeling was exacerbated by the senior citizen on my left who suddenly became unFilipino. He started to root for Marquez. Jeering at every Pacquiao miss, and cheering for every Marquez connection. I wanted to ask him to shut up. Worse, I wanted to do to him what Pacquiao was failing to do to Marquez. At least I wanted to shout at him 'Pinoy ka ba?'. He might have just shot back at me, 'Oo, kaya doble cara ako!'.

By the 11th round, I thought Pacquiao had to knockdown Marquez to steal a win. No knockdown came but I think he did enough to salvage a merciful draw. When Michael Buffer announced the decision, I was to first to jump and whoop it up immediately after hearing the the words 'and still...'. Manny eked about a majority decision.

A split second after, the rest of the audience followed after realizing that our boy won. I whooped it up to the face of the unFilipino to my left. I was not surprised to see him wildly jumping and shouting too. He suddenly became a Filipino again. Typically Pinoy.

PS. If Marquez cannot accept the outcome of the first two fights, he will never accept this one either. He may have a point this time although this one's arguably a draw.