Can Clottey make Pacquiao submit?

Look for Manny Pacquiao to fold under the heavy pressure from Joshua Clottey on March 13th. When this fight was first signed, I thought this would be simple cut and dried case of Pacquiao being too good for Clottey. But after seeing how good Clottey is looking in training and doing some research into his last fight against Miguel Cotto, I think Clottey is going to batter Pacquiao like a rag doll and ultimately make him submit or have his trainer Freddie Roach step in for him to yank Pacquiao from the fight.

It’s going to be a shocking loss, to be sure, but when you look at how big and powerful Clottey is, and how much motivation he’ll have for this fight, it’s not going to be that surprising. Pacquiao is already rich beyond belief in the Philippines, and doesn’t need to work another day in his life if he doesn’t want to.

In contrast, Clottey is still a struggling fighter and has yet to get the huge paydays that Pacquiao has grown accustomed to getting. As a result, Clottey is going to be fighting at a level that we’ve never seen him fight before. If any of you are familiar with the James Buster Douglas vs. Mike Tyson fight in 1990, you’ll notice that Douglas, a good fighter, fought well beyond his normal ability in that fight and surprised Tyson, dominating most of the fight with his high energy attack and eventually taking Tyson out in the 10th round.

Douglas probably would have lost to Tyson under normal circumstances, but the motivation and adrenalin that Douglas was able to summon up for that one fight alone was enough for him to pull off the upset and capture Tyson’s IBF/WBA/WBC heavyweight titles. Unfortunately for Douglas, he wasn’t able to sustain this high level for long, as he was immediately beaten in his next fight against Evander Holyfield, losing a 3rd round knockout in October 1990.

But that doesn’t matter for Clottey, just as long as he fights well above his ability in this one fight, I think he can beat Pacquiao, capture his WBO title and set himself up for big money in a rematch with the Filipino star in the future. Clottey has everything to gain in this fight, while Pacquiao is likely looking past this bout for a potential big money bout against the winner of the May 1st bout between Floyd Mayweather Jr. and Shane Mosley.

For Clottey to beat Pacquiao, he’s going to have to stay off the ropes, resist covering up for long stretches at a time and to make sure he goes after Pacquiao constantly to try and wear him down. Clottey will have to also depend on his chin to be able to take a certain amount of punishing shots from Pacquiao, because he won’t get far if he’s getting dropped left and right like Pacquiao’s recent victims Ricky Hatton and Miguel Cotto. Those fighters were never able to really challenge Pacquiao because they were almost immediately in trouble in the fight and found themselves getting knocked down repeatedly.