Oscar De La Hoya: "Cotto will stop Pacquiao in the later rounds"

Pittsburgh Fight Sports Examiner | Scott Heritage

Former Pacquiao victim Oscar De La Hoya has predicted that Cotto will win their upcoming fight by knockout. In a turnaround from his earlier prediction that Pacquiao would beat any of the other Welterweight champions, De La Hoya is now backing Cotto.

Most of his prediction seems to be based on the fact that Cotto is so much bigger and stronger than Pacquiao, and the fact that he says Manny "couldn't hurt him" in their fight.

So far, Manny's power seems to have transferred well up the weight classes, having no trouble knocking out Ricky Hatton for example. The other thing he will always have over Cotto is his speed, which even is his power lets him down is something he can use to win the fight. Whether or not De La Hoya's analysis makes much sense has to be called into question considering Pacquiao stopped him at the end of the eighth round.

“Then, as the fight was getting closer and closer and I thought more about it, I’m now convinced Cotto will win. The reason is, first, nobody looks good against Clottey. He’s a difficult, strong, in-your-face type of fighter. And Cotto had that gash over his eye the whole fight. I thought he did an excellent job in light of that,” he added.

“Cotto has a good chin and a big heart. He’s a natural welterweight who hits hard and is also smart and fast. Pacquiao doesn’t hit hard enough to knock anyone out in the welterweight division. I’m basing that on my fight against Pacquiao. I could’ve stood there and put my face in front of him and he couldn’t have hurt me,”

“I think Cotto is a smart fighter. I think he’ll get through those first few rounds and in a smart way he’ll walk down Pacquiao and possibly stop him in the later rounds,”

Perhaps Oscar doubts Manny's power due to the fact that he wasn't able to put him down cleanly in one shot, but for someone fighting so far above his starting weight this isn't anything too concerning. Particularly not since he still stopped De La Hoya anyway and still has his speed advantage if all else fails.

If Cotto walks through all of Manny's best punches, then all Pacquiao has to do is to keep away from Cotto's power shots and pick him off from a distance. Not only this but Cotto has shown himself to be vulnerable to cuts in the past, which is something he will have to look out for during the fight against Manny.

Source: http://www.examiner.com/x-20066-Pittsburgh-Fight-Sports-Examiner~y2009m11d6-Oscar-De-La-Hoya-Cotto-will-stop-Pacquiao-in-the-later-rounds