Star Boxing

Promoter Bob Arum is giving Manny Pacquiao a big chance against Floyd Mayweather due to his style and stance.

Manny Pacquiao has suffered a pair of losses -- one controversial, one definitive -- in recent years, but the Hall of Fame-bound fighter has also stormed back with three dominant performances since then, and promoter Bob Arum believes that Manny has a great shot when he faces Floyd Mayweather on May 2.

Arum cites his own experience working as Mayweather's promoter, and the long-held belief that Mayweather has problems with lefties -- particularly those with speed.

"The reason I like my guy's chances so much is because of his speed, the tremendous number of punches he throws, the quality of his punches and the fact that he is left-handed. Top Rank promoted Floyd Mayweather for 10½ years and we recognized that he had difficulty handling a speedy, left-handed fighter and that he and his father (and trainer, Floyd Mayweather Sr.) were insistent that we not match Floyd with a southpaw. I remember two fights he had with southpaws who didn't have the ability Mann has but who gave him trouble -- (DeMarcus) 'Chop Chop' Corley, who buzzed him and had him in real trouble and Zab Judah."

The Corley fight was in 2004, and the Judah fight in 2006, so we're talking a decade since either of those bouts, give or take a year either way. Mayweather (47-0, 26 KO) has fought a pair of southpaws since the win over Judah, knocking out Victor Ortiz in 2011 and dominating Robert Guerrero in 2013.

Of course, nobody is going to argue that Ortiz or Guerrero are on the level of Manny Pacquiao, and Arum is right on the button noting that the differences are really speed and workrate, plus Pacquiao is a master of controlling the distance he wants.

Do you think Pacquiao's style presents serious problems for Mayweather, the sort of thing he's perhaps tried to avoid over his career?

The fight is set. So who ya got?

Floyd Mayweather and Manny Pacquiao are 100{785f1b6326cdeb4275f63506ca40214b5c07db8f245df0cea7927e7aae5a72b6} officially set to meet on May 2 in Las Vegas, and even with all the other minutiae around the fight coming down the wire, and being discussed endlessly, there is really just the one big question: Who wins?

Mayweather (47-0, 26 KO) has never lost a pro fight, of course. Some will argue the should have an L from back in 2002 against Jose Luis Castillo, but he doesn't. At the end of the day, as they say, 47 (well, 45) have tried, and 47 (well, 45) have failed. Will Pacquiao (57-5-2, 38 KO) be No. 48 (well, 46), or will he finally become the man to -- ugh -- "crack the Mayvinci Code"?

Give me a moment to recover from putting my fingers on a keyboard and making those words happen. I'm really sorry.

OK.

OK.

Let's go.

Who ya got? Is Mayweather, who turns 38 in a few days, more vulnerable than ever before? And even if he is, can the 36-year-old Pacquiao find enough openings to actually beat the man? Do you buy into the old line that Mayweather struggles with southpaws, despite never losing to one, and despite the fact that his greatest tests have come against a right-handed body puncher? Does Floyd still have such superior reflexes that he can dance on Pacquiao all night long and potshot him for a full 12 rounds?

Has someone slipped enough to make this easy for the other man, or is this going to be a classic battle of skills and wills? WHO R U PICKING?