MORNING KOMBAT WITH LUKE THOMAS AND BRIAN CAMPBELL - 🚨 Manny Pacquiao vs. Yordenis Ugas Instant Analysis

Episode Date: August 22, 2021

Brian Campbell provides instant analysis of Yordenis Ugas' victory over Manny Pacquiao to retain the WBA Super Welterweight Title. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

How's it brah? We're back at it. Morning combat instant analysis very late on Saturday night. Brian Campbell, of course, one half of your MK duo, the coast hostess with the mostest. Of course, we hit you up every Monday, Wednesday and Friday 11 a.m. Eastern on YouTube. This, of course, is IA edition right after the big upset from Las Vegas when your Dennis Ugas makes the first defense of his WBA

welterweight title on 11 days notice, filling in for3, 116-112, and 116-112. Ugas, the biggest fight of his life, the biggest performance of his life, and now Manny left one year out from, sorry, one month out from where he will announce whether he will run for the presidency in the Philippines in next year, which he is expected to do. From what I hear, we don't know what his fighting future is and neither does he. He said it will be one at a time. Well, we got one here tonight to break down. Was it Pacquiao's age or was this Ugas's night or maybe a little bit of both?

Quick housekeeping like this video. Subscribe to what we do here on Morning Combat. Yes, this has been the week of BC. Luke Thomas enjoying the tail end of his two-week, two-week, two freaking weeks. You kidding me? Vacation, but your boy BC had you covered this week with some friends, with some solo work. Going to do that right here, but the push to 100K. We want to see this MK rocket ship hit the mark. So please subscribe subscribe tell your

friends spread it like an std let's get into this fight this was supposed to be the summer blockbuster spence pacquiao dare to be great for the old man spence two years our old man pacquiao two-year layoff we know what happened torn retina for spence but the idea was although this won't be the same event right it won't be the same event, right? It won't be the biggest party of the summer, so to speak, for boxing. It's still a sneaky good fight. Nobody really liked the $80 price tag on that PBC on Fox pay-per-view, but you knew that you could see a technical battle. You knew you could see two of the top five welterweights in the world. And that's important because this is traditionally the money division, especially in this, you know,

post nineties up and down heavyweight era. We're in a Renaissance heavyweight era now, but we know how long that cold hard winter was during the Klitschko brothers run. Welterweight has been the division. So you get two top fives here. I mean, if Pacquiao had straight up announced, he was coming back on pay-per-view against Spence, nobody would expect it blockbuster sales, but we would have been excited. And I think you found out pretty quickly in the first half, it kind of went to how I predicted that most people would have expected blockbuster sales, but we would have been excited. And I think you found out pretty quickly in the first half.

It kind of went to how I predicted that most people would have it scored 3-3, and both fighters would have made sort of contrasting adjustments. And that's what we saw. So before we get going down the, did Pacquiao lose this fight because he's 42 road? First half of the fight, Pacquiao was aggressive and crisp. And, you know, did he look like the guy two years ago against Keith Thurman not exactly but that guy was on the tail end of a resurgent comeback year meaning not just the calendar year of 2019 where he won two fights be Adrian Broner on pay-per-view in January and then came back in July to give Keith Thurman his

first loss but that was his third fight in 12 actual months because his original comeback fight in 2018 was against Matisse excuse me and knocked him out so it was you know activity we said this with Conor McGregor and MMA activity to keep the timing to keep all that in hindsight right in hindsight there's almost a look there's a there's a risk reward thing when you dare to be great so so i praise pacquiao and the pre-fight previews on video and in print like we should have him signing up to face spence at 42 coming off a two-year break it's like that's wild right that's there to be great that's big balls even him fighting ugas on 11 days notice is big balls uh I wonder in hindsight if Pacquiao who ended up getting all this house money on his favor for what he did in 2019

you know kind of just thought I can just be that guy again and the first half of the fight he didn't look exactly like that guy but he looked good enough and had his own moments enough where, you know, I can't go 70, 30 Pacquiao old to 30% Ugas won this fight. Cause he was good because the second half of this fight was all Ugas. And I think the second half of this fight was all Ugas more for the things that he did really well than the things that limited Pacquiao. I think it's almost a double narrative that came together. I mean, the answer on, on most debates is typically in the middle. And the second half of the fight, we saw a Pacquiao a step or two behind. Was that age? Yes, but it was also, let's be honest, here's what Ugas did

well. He did things that I said I didn't know he could do, meaning I knew technically he was strong. I knew if he felt there was an opening like against porter in that second half he could get up close get behind that guard and trade big shots with you because he's got certain advantages other fighters don't have you know technique and timing and all that i thought on the big stage against pacquiao he might have a failure launch to show that i feared he wouldn't throw enough punches that didn't turn out to be a problem I feared um you know that Pacquiao's experience and his ability to constantly make adjustments to to feint and threaten and just get you to open up your guard so he can explode you know I thought eventually he was going to find Ugas and then he would be the one putting Ugas into the shell of

throwing two little punches and being nervous of getting knocked out. It kind of became the other way around. I don't think you saw Pacquiao who was straight up physically, visibly nervous of getting knocked out. But I think part of what looked like him getting old over the second half of the fight was the mental fatigue that comes with. I've tried everything I've got in this arsenal. And from the sixth round on, ugas has closed all the doors this was a brilliant technical fight by ugas before i break that part down of what he did right your knee-jerk reaction to seeing old pacquiao right we're gonna see the pacquiao of old or we're gonna see old Pacquiao we saw old Pacquiao for the most part but but the the reaction to to potentially seeing old Pacquiao

is again that that you you spend too much time down that road on that narrative that it was all because of of old Pacquiao and and and you can easily go okay well if he would have fought Spence good thing he didn't fight Spence right he? He would have got stopped. And I know that it looks like that because of what Ugas just did. And because of Ugas, you know, disarming Pacquiao and frustrating him and kind of making him look old. It's like, Oh God, you know, what would have Spence done? And I get that. And I, it's not that I disagree with that, but we do know you can't do boxing math or MMA math with matchmaking styles,

make fights. It's like the most, you know, we've heard that ad frigging nauseam right um but it's true I wonder if Pacquiao watched the Errol Spence Sean Porter fight to that closed 2019 on pay-per-view in September and let's remember what happened in that fight Porter was more dynamic and slicker than we thought he could be against Spence and And that Spence thought he could be. And that Spence now after the fact is, is admitting, I didn't listen to what my coach said all during training camp. I had a little bit of a beef with Sean and I wanted to show him that I'm the bigger puncher. And I got more dog. You know,

I hosted that PBC on Fox face off between them where Spence sat back. He's like, you know, Sean, you know, that's great, man. All these skills you got in this experience, but I'm better than you in every category and if it gets down to a fight I got more dog in me than you it was like it was like the ultimate like you know can you kick my ass and what happened in that fight was Porter had arguably the best performance of his career in a close split decision defeat and Spence got into a brawl and stayed there i wonder if manny who has a style that is not similar to porter but there's some similarities with the explosiveness

and the way you dodge and set up and in uh you know um hide your attacks before coming in i wonder if he said look i'm quicker than porter a little bit more dynamic come from you know bursts from from awkward angles i could do that against spence and when i say i can do that what does that mean what does it mean i can go knock him out not necessarily what it means is i can get spence into a brawl which the thing about errol spence is being one of the pound for pound best in the world unbeaten unified champion is he's great in every single category he's so freaking elite well not just well-rounded elite well-rounded he's got-rounded. He's got everything,

but if you can pigeonhole him into just being one thing, a brawler, you're in, if that's your strength, which it is for Pacquiao, you're inevitably going to have a chance. So I wonder even if we saw Spence Pacquiao tonight, still going to predict that Spence would have won that fight. I wonder though, if he would have been able to with the the buzz that comes with being in a pay-per-view main event in Las Vegas with the crowd going nuts was the action intensifies and

the crowd and at the T-Mobile arena was all for Pacquiao I wonder if Pacquiao still with the things that he tried to do to Ugas to get underneath the defense but couldn't if that part would have worked against Spence because Spence would have been a willing partner to try to brawl with him doesn't mean Manny would have won it just means it would have worked to get Spence because Spence would have been a willing partner to try to brawl with him. Doesn't mean Manny would have won. It just means it would have given Manny a better chance. The risk reward thing on betting Ugas and backing him as an underdog is the same reason why we say, okay, new opponent, but still a tough matchup. The very best potential of Ugas was to go in there and do exactly what he just

did. Play chess with Manny Pacquiao although I didn't think again that Ugas was going to be able to play chess from two three feet away behind his high guard and slow out the output of Pacquiao and make him have to play chess and just out slick him I thought essentially that Pacquiao would eventually find that chin and it would you know dissuade Ugas or that like I just said before that Ugas maybe on the biggest moment wouldn't have given the best effort in the biggest effort and that's the risk if you were going to bet ugas you know the stuff that he's been able to do against the second tier guys can he do that against a manny pacquiao well again a little bit old manny pacquiao the two-year layoff didn't help ugas best performance of his career it just was that

perfect storm where if you are Manny and you're gonna have to fight somebody on 11 days notice this is the 100% wrong style of guy to fight and that's what we saw here Pacquiao got disarmed by that second half on so here's what Ugas did it was the comfortability to stand in front of Manny as the bigger guy with longer arms and that high guard you understand what that mentally does to a fighter when somebody when their opponents can stand in front of you and counter with you and and even though Manny had a speed advantage which he used in those alternating first six rounds when they split them who got us figured out how to count what's the one way to beat speed like who's the only fighter with the exception of floyd mayweather who who was who had the speed advantage and the

technical brilliance but no one else has it on that level no one else could do to manny pacquiao you know in his prime or near his prime what floyd did except for juan manuel marquez why well because marquez is a badass because marquez would be willing to punch with manny which very few people do and because marquez is such a brilliant counter puncher that he can take that risk and land the big one because how do you beat speed in boxing you beat it with timing so Ugas figured out how to time Manny's jab and hit him with a harder counter and then he figured out how to land counter right hands and then he figured out how to get creative it's weird And then he figured out how to get creative. It's weird in a fight. Normally Manny's the quote unquote,

abstract painter who's going to come at you from such crazy angles and different that you're just sort of like, you know, go back and rewatch the Shane Mosley fight. He gets knocked down around three and he's just like, yo, what, what is going on here? What, like, what, what am I fighting? You know, watch a Ricky Hatton against them. Watch, you know, like, just like Oscar de la Hoya against man you're like i i don't know where these punches are coming from um you know that that that didn't happen here you know that didn't happen at all

and it was uh ugas's ability to counter right in front of him to stand there where manny wasn't able to fill the gaps and fill the holes because the kind of the thing about Manny is even though he's an aggressive fighter who looks for brawls he's also incredibly smart he's a great IQ has great feints can set things up you know he did that against Thurman he did it beautifully against Thurman uh and he also made Thurman want to be more of a boxer than a puncher because again of that power that the same power that changed Mosley's mindset when he came in there um it didn't change Ugas's because Ugas you know he's an amateur national champion out of the Cuban system he's not afraid of any I went to the Olympics won a bronze medal he's not afraid of anything he did he defected like that's not

what he's about he's an artist that can go out there and not throw enough punches like a lot of big time Cuban fighters do and respect the, the, the, the, the defense sliding out of the way too much. It was funny how we got altered that he didn't have such a brilliant defensive night because he was swiveling or being shifty against Manny. He stood in the pocket against Manny, but was so responsible with his guard and still able to get off enough offensively that it was absolutely brilliant. And one of the

reasons that he did that, and I know I was trying to circle it to it before and I hit a dead end, but I'm back. Okay. Is that Manny's normally the artist. That's what I'm trying to say. Manny's normally the guy throwing the more weird things that you don't see. It's hard to prepare for. It turned out Ugas did that to Manny in this fight. And he did it particularly with two punches, his right hand to the body, but his side arm shot to the body that can get disguised when he would throw it. And it's almost looking like it's going to be like a riser,

like a head punch, but it's sort of this sidearm one. It's like he's throwing a, you know, junk ball or something in baseball. And then the looping right hand he was using at times to counter and other times he was using it as a lead it's not easy to jab a south paw from the orthodox position ugas did that and you have to have little tricks and one of the best ways to control a southpaw especially one with speed and power when you're in the orthodox position is the lead right hand and i mean it was just brilliant what he did and you know he walked that tight rope and you had that fear that the judges weren't going to give it to

him we're going to respect it and the judges were perfect in the end and two of them had it 116 112 which is eight rounds to four which is exactly how i scored it and um it was great to see that we'd never mishap in that regard but in that second half you started to go around six seven eight okay it's not that there weren't close rounds in there but in that second half you started to go around six seven eight okay it's not that there weren't close rounds in there but in those rounds anytime manny tried to do the things that he normally tried to does due to sway judges and i thought joe goosen kind of said it perfectly on the broadcast sean porter echoed it later too like manny knows how they say manny knows how to win 12 round fights what's like he knows how to make his stuff look better than it is to sway judges.

And when Manny finds an opening and comes through with a three, four punch comedy, it's so flashy looking. The crowd automatically rises. I think there was some of that in the first half of the fight where he wasn't even necessarily landing, but it looked good against you guys. We got shut that shit down in the second half of the fight that Manny stopped trying to do it fight. Then Manny stopped trying to do it consistently, and Manny got frustrated. And when Manny started lowering

his output, that's what allowed Ugas to be able to win this fight without having to be the aggressor, right? While his jab was good, if you try to be the aggressor against Manny Pacquiao, with him having the speed advantage and him being the more explosive, harder guy to figure out unorthodox style, you're typically going to get countered. But Ugas had this sort of, you know, you have to be a big welterweight to pull it off. Let's give Jeff Horn credit, whether you thought that Jeff Horn decision was bunk or not. And I scored that fight to draw him one of the rare people who I guess recognized what Horn was doing right and rewarded it. But, you know, a big part of what Horn did was he was just a really big welterweight, and he stood in front of Manny and took the punishment and kept coming.

Ugas was a really big welterweight, but he didn't need to take that punishment because the defense was so sound. He was smart to know how to counter, and because he disarmed Manny, he didn't have to worry as much on the back end or throwing too many punches. Now, in the end, he did outland Manny. I believe it was 101 to 88, I think was the final tally, according to CompuBox. But here's the key stat. You'll almost never see this. In fact, there's an old adage in boxing when you look at the CompuBox stats that if somebody, if a boxer has landed at least 50% of his power shots you know 90 of the time he has won the

fight it's rare there's been some great fights i think mickle kessler in the rematch with uh carl frotch their two fight series at super middleweight incredible the rematch kessler landed more than the 55 of his power shots but lost a close decision in a great fight um even when you land 40 more than 40 of your of your power shots it's looked at as you had the advantage who got signed at 59 percent of his power shots and he wasn't wasting them anyway you know like i mean it was it was brilliant that's what i loved about this fight wasn't a lot of two-way action there were some pockets at the end of rounds particularly in the second half where man he was like man i gotta do something but this this fight was was chess i mean it wasn't let me let me let me clarify my my my

labels here it wasn't high speed chess high speed chess is my favorite type of boxing match we all love a gaudy ward war right we all love that kind of stuff but revisit oscar de la joya shane mosley won from 2000 at welterweight that's the best freaking example of high speed chess. You know, you can never see where it's not a brawl, but the pace is so high. The technique is so high. And because the technique and the pace are at such a high and perfection level, it becomes, you know, a quasi action fight because of that. And there's ebbs and flows and changes of momentum.

This wasn't high speed chess. It was like low speed chess. That's a good ass technical fight. And this is the problem with Ugas. If you get into a good ass technical fight with him and you're not landing the bigger shots, you know, and you're having trouble, that's the fight he can win.

So in hindsight, should Manny Pacquiao have given back to the sport once again giving back to the fans with great matchmaking right fighting Spence here when he doesn't need to I mean could have fought you could have fought anybody right could have fought a YouTuber anybody all right taking this fight on 11 days notice to keep the train on the tracks to get his money and like Rafe Bartholomew said on this show on Tuesday, is it a political strategy for Pacquiao, the national hero who's expected to run for presidency,

but as of right now, not, you know, some people think he has a chance to win it. Other people think he has no chance to try to use that good pub of going into the political season, fresh off a big win where nobody said he could do it. I think in his mind, he thought, I have a chance to get that against Spence. I have a chance to lure him into a fight and get that.

Because maybe Manny's still thinking, look, I was just that guy against Keith Irvin two years ago. I can be that guy again. I don't doubt that Manny trains really hard between fights, plays basketball, boxes, unlike a lot of guys who just kind of take vacations. I mean, I know the modern-day boxer doesn't get fat and smoke cigarettes and drink like the guy like our heroes in the 80s you know and before that did between fights but um you know i thought i thought he was going to be able to to i'm sure he thought he was going to be able to bounce back uh physically in a better spot but him doing that solid for us to save this pay-per-view turned out to be the

worst thing for him and i think half of the narrative was he showed up old and the other half is that your dennis hugas is really freaking good i thought he beat sean porter so did a lot of people at the very least he showed you that he's of that ilk could he be errol spence jr i mean he could but again with styles i style wise, it's a bad one for him because I think Spence can match his technical output while still being very busy and landing enough where Pacquiao wasn't able to maybe because of that size difference, maybe because of the age creeping up and the mental fatigue and all that stuff I said, but Spence is, you know, in this prime, probably quicker than Ugas, hits harder, just as technical. So that's a bad matchup. But, you know, with this win, Ugas made his career. I mean, you know, you made the first line of your obituary,

whether that's morbid or not. But you did that in boxing. And, you know, he did something big. And I think he can beat Danny Garcia And I think he can beat Danny Garcia. I think he can beat Sean Porter. I think he can beat, you know, could he beat Terrence Crawford? Probably not. But he's of the silk.

He's going to deserve these unification fights. This is a big fight. Should Manny Pacquiao fight again after this? It's going to depend on his politics schedule and dreams and goals and all that. But I think it's going to depend on activity too. He fought three times in 12 months from 2018 to 2019. It's easier to look great. It's not so easy after two years. So what do you like? If he wins the presidency,

will he fight as president as Freddie Roach said? Maybe, maybe that would be a big deal, but I think we will see pacquiao again his love of the game is too strong i think he showed in the first half of this fight at least that he still got it and if he can refine it a little bit more he's still a credible a side commercially but b side critically against any fighter he wants to fight any elite welterweight any elite lightweight that can move up even if he wants to go easier i know there was some talk he might want to fight josh taylor who has the four titles at 140 pounds or uh mikey garcia was a fight he was trying to make for a while or amir khan which by the way would be a manny knockout so that's probably the best that's probably the best bit of matchmaking manny if manny still wants to fight he should probably

come back and knock out amir k. And then you start to go, okay, which welterweight can I make a fight with? That'd be fun and it would sell because Manny will still sell. He's still really fun to watch the Manny that, that played it safe after the Marquez knockout loss in 2012, the guy against Brandon Rios and Chris Algieri, who I mean, it's Algieri knocked him down a million times, but still, that guy was more of a boxer.

The time off he had after that Horn fight in which Jeff Horn made Manny Pacquiao fight made him have to brawl I think it brought out the the brawler again in Manny Pacquiao and I think tonight again to circle back to that narrative he just he just didn't have the juice so to speak bad word here right because because you know we're all assuming everyone's on the juice but he didn't have that extra juice in the tank to uh to get it done i think he can repair that with activity if he wants to but i don't think he ever wins an elite fight again i mean but you know he's a 42 year old welterweight who relies on speed and explosiveness he's already just sprinkling on top of the the great resume and legacy already with just extra bonus points. So it will be interesting because a long time ago, I predicted that Manny loves this game too

much and loves to fight that you're not going to see him go out on a high note. And you're probably not going to see him want to go away when stuff starts to go bad because there's think about when in the mma when chuck liddell was just getting knocked out for a few in a row like in his mind he still got it he's still that dude i could still like you know like that's what it's like when for these guys so manny i i've always had that fear that he's just gonna hang around and keep trying to you know i mean look at look at the end for ali it was like him just trying to find make a fire out of something on a deserted island, right? Trying to rub anything together to try to find a spark within himself to get back or

get at the end. It was just trying to find a spark of other people who would be willing to help him put on the big fights that he still thinks he can somehow win. I hope that's not for Manny because, good God, he's had 70-something fights and so many of them have been wars it's just ridiculous again that he was in this spot but you know i saw i saw an older manny but i didn't see a well i didn't see a completely washed one what he tried to do against ugas i think he could still do against a lot of fighters even some quasi elite guys but um it's good theater in the end, you know,

in the life cycle of combat sports, you do need the young to eat the old, right? That's, that's the food chain. It's, it's sad when it happens particularly by knockout by force, right. When it happens that way, but this was sort of a clean transaction in that way where, okay, Manny's no longer this. I mean, Manny was, I say he was playing with house money the last two years with his with his res with his legacy with his like in the moment

legacy with his stock i guess is really what i'm looking for i mean it was just stupid it was like is there a welterweight who can who like can beat manny like it was just like you know if he can look that good against thurman could he beat crawford could he beat Spence but you know that was unrealistic and that was like Superman stuff and um it can't be that anymore so it was sort of a passing of a torch I don't think Ugas is going to go on to be in another pay-per-view unless it's for all four belts but you know it's a big win for him and and you know for a guy who had a huge amateur career came to the pros suffered back-to-back defeats on his initial climb quit the sport for like two years come back and put the run together that he has it's good to see it's good it's good

transaction good piece of business on saturday night in las vegas thank you very much fun little undercard too yes the second half of that co-main between washed welterweight, former champions, Robert Guerrero and Victor Ortiz was just brutal. First half was pretty fun though. Pretty fun. The first half was, was the good moments of what you can get for a hashtag old guy fight. And you know, I love that. So yeah, we'll be, I'll be back at least Monday. I don't think Luke's back on Monday.

Spoiler alert for morning Combat. But if you can wish... They call me the King of Connecticut. I guess they call Apathy the King of Connecticut. I'm not the prince. I'm not Prince. We're going to eat pancakes and hoops. What are we doing here? We're purple

shirts. Big, big... I like Prince, by the way, a lot. That guitar solo he had at the Rock and hall of fame concert while my guitar gently weaves it's like it's like there was like some hendrix voodoo shit going on there you know i remember he threw the guitar up at the end and it never came down i mean that was just some wild shit the guy's in virtue freaking oso and like four different categories love you some prince um but us in Connecticut, we're about to, we're about to get banged out with this hurricane. So hopefully that doesn't affect the filming schedule for,

for Monday and beyond or the travel schedule as Luke and I are set to head out to Tyron Woodley, Jake Paul, the Showtime pay-per-view next Sunday night, August 29th. But if things go well, if roofs don't get blown out, then I'll be there and I'm gonna freaking bring it okay i'm gonna absolutely bring it all right team usa team canada we're on the same team it's gonna be wild it's gonna be wild all right this documentary i hope they can turn it around quick uh room service diary should be wackadoo all right well uh this fight wasn't wackadoo maybe my analysis was but um it's late bc he let it all hang out again so did your denis ugas unanimous decision the wba champion gonna roll on we saw the uh the hero the living legend manny pacquiao go down could have been lot worse. Could have been a lot sadder. I think he saved

a little bit of face in the end, and he was humble. I mean, he did point to the excuse. He did get to it quick and tell you why, right? I only had 11 days to prepare. I mean, it's legitimate. Took the fight. Not everybody's going to take that fight, so shout out to Manny. I mean, let's

not forget one thing about Manny. When he got robbed against Timothy Bradley in the first fight in 2012 and robbed right never complained never complained the only complaint that I hated from Manny Peca was the shoulder injury excuse after the after the Mayweather fight I believe he had an injury I believe there was a level of injury there but I think after we, they were like, oh, go back out to the press conference and talk about your shoulder the whole time. And he did that. And I didn't like that. So what?

It got healed in the salt water. All of our heroes can't be perfect. But we didn't see our hero get carried out, at least. So interesting night of boxing. I'm delirious. I'm going to hit the hay. Like, subscribe, all that good stuff. Three times a week, the best show they ever made. Bonus live chats. Imagine if we got a BC live chat. What are you kidding me?

What are you kidding me? All right. Just me and me and rowdy Roddy over here. I mean, this is great. Um, CM Punk to AEW. Yeah. Brock Lesnar with a man bun. What a weekend. What a weekend of combat sports of the real kind of descriptive kind of fake kind. Yeah. I'm signing off Brian Campbell, BC. Two gosses night. I love you. We out.