Strength and conditioning coach Justin Fortune stood firm on his previous prediction that Manny Pacquiao will score a dominating win in his upcoming fight against Chris Algieri.
Fortune, who has been preparing Pacquiao hard for his fight against Algieri on November 22 in Macau, said in an interview with Rappler that the Filipino boxing icon is having fun in training - and it is not a good sign for his next opponent because it means that the 35-year-old will be more dangerous.
"If you have an athlete who is content and happy and trains hard, then you have an excellent athlete," Fortune said. "If you're playing your sport and you're fucking miserable, you'll never get that response out of an athlete."
Fortune also recently predicted that if Pacquiao maintains his focus in training camp and follow Freddie Roach's fight plan on November 22, the fight will not go the distance because Algieri will be knocked out.
Like Fortune, Roach also expressed confidence that Pacquiao will successfully defend his World Boxing Organization welterweight title against his unbeaten challenger - very confident that he is already talking about a possible showdown between his prized fighter and junior welterweight champion Danny Garcia.
Garcia, the reigning World Boxing Council and World Boxing Association light welterweight champion, has already expressed interest in facing the former pound-for-pound king next year.
"Danny Garcia would be a good fight but now he's talking about going to 147," Roach said. "There's a lot of competition in the 140-pound division, a lot of them are going to 147 because they want to fight Manny for the bigger money but as soon as Manny goes to 140 all of those will come back down."
Meanwhile, Pacquiao is also set to make his debut as playing-coach in the 2014-15 Philippine Basketball Association (PBA) on Sunday when his team, Kia Sorento, take on fellow expansion team Blackwater Sports.
Roach said that he has permitted Pacquiao to play on Sunday, but not too much because he could put himself at risk, which could lead to the cancellation of his scheduled fight against Algieri.
"He will play basketball this Saturday, he said he won't even break a sweat," Roach said. "He says he'll do it for the audience and then coach the game. After that there will be no more basketball on that level, but he'll stop playing basketball at his house 4 weeks before the fight."
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