Boxing legend Manny Pacquiao stopped by to talk about his career and what it takes to be one of the greatest boxers of all time. Manny and his trainer, Bo Mack and Terrence Crawford, also stopped by and talked about the importance of putting in the time and effort to get to the highest level possible in order to be the best at what he does. Manny talks about how he got to where he is today, what it's like to be a professional boxer, and what he's looking forward to in the future. Manny also talks about his favorite fighters growing up and how he was influenced by some of the best boxers in the history of the sport, including Floyd Mayweather Jr. and Roy Jones Jr., and how they influenced him in his boxing career. Manny also discusses how he trains and prepares for his upcoming fight with Canelo Alvarez on Saturday night at the Staples Center in Los Angeles, and why he thinks Canelo is the best in the business right now and who should win the next fight against Canelo vs. Canelo at the next stop on the UFC Card. . We hope you enjoy this episode, it's a must-listen! Thank you for tuning in to the Inside the Ring Podcast! -Your Hosts: , and & - Thanks for listening to Inside The Ring Subscribe to Outside the Boxer Podcast Subscribe on Apple Podcasts! Subscribe on iTunes Learn more about your ad choices and much more! Subscribe and Share the podcast on your favorite streaming service! If you like what you're listening to, share it on your social media platform, please leave us a review and tell us what you think of our podcast is listening to us on your thoughts on what we should be listening to! and what you re listening to on your podcast should we should do in the next episode or what we're listening about it should we do next week and what s your thoughts are listening to you should we recommend to you do in a review or what else we should listen to on our podcast? or what you would like to do in your feed? We'll be looking out for you're getting a review on our next episode of Inside The Boxer and what we can do more of your favorite thing we should we listen to in our podcast and what they should do next, etc. etc. Thank you, we'll be listening out for your comments and review it!
00:00:33.000Yeah, since I was little, I remember getting in trouble because I used to always switch and my coach used to always say, you need to worry about fighting the one style first and perfecting that before you try to switch and do a different style.
00:00:48.000But I'll always switch, so it got to the point where it was just like, alright, well, you're going to fight like that, we're going to train like that.
00:01:10.000That's part of what's interesting about watching you fight.
00:01:13.000Watching you fight is that you can see you trying to figure out what's up.
00:01:18.000Like first rounds when you fight is one of my favorite things to watch because I see you measuring dudes.
00:01:23.000I see things happening and you're switching stances and then when you start finding the timing Timing is one of the more fascinating things to watch about boxing.
00:01:33.000Because a guy who has perfect timing and perfect...
00:01:36.000When you see a guy make a read and then execute and it's perfect, it's one of the most beautiful things in all of sports.
00:01:43.000It's like you're watching every move and then you're just dissecting them slowly.
00:01:49.000How do you think, do you think about it, like, when you start a round, a first round of a fight, is it different for every fighter, or do you always want to do that?
00:01:58.000Do you always want to, like, put him into the computer?
00:02:08.000And then sometimes I'll just be like, alright, I'm going to take my time and, you know, figure him out, see how fast he is, see, you know, what things he like to do and what he don't like to do, or see if I move this way, his reaction, just certain things.
00:02:27.000You came to the UFC this weekend, and obviously I love MMA, but one of the things that I love about boxing is when you take away all the elements, you take away wrestling and kicking and all that stuff, you get the highest level of exchanges and punches.
00:02:41.000And you get to see with guys like you or guys like Canelo or Floyd or the top-level boxers.
00:02:46.000You get to see what's possible with guys that are training with the best scientific methods and with all the knowledge of all the past fighters.
00:02:54.000I mean, when you were growing up, what was the fighter that influenced you the most?
00:02:58.000Well, hands down Floyd Mayweather and Roy Jones Jr. You know, I used to...
00:03:05.000Love watching Roy Jones Jr. I'm pretty sure everybody was a fan of Roy.
00:03:10.000But set aside Roy, I always watched Floyd Mayweather and Pernell Whitaker.
00:03:16.000I was too young for Sugar Ray Leonard and them.
00:04:34.000I always say, with or without him, I'm going to the Hall of Fame.
00:04:39.000When you look at all the things that I've accomplished in the sport of boxing, People that's in the Hall of Fame didn't even accomplish that.
00:04:48.000So I just tell people, I don't need him.
00:05:33.000You know, it's all about business, but at the same time, my side of the deal is ready whenever.
00:05:43.000And you can see all the interviews out there, man.
00:05:45.000You can see where if it's Terrence or myself or Bob or anybody that's affiliated with Tim Crawford, We all say we want to fight.
00:05:57.000We can have a fight tomorrow, you know, if we wanted to.
00:06:01.000But we know, realistically, it won't happen.
00:06:04.000So do you think that he's waiting for the right time marketing-wise, or do you think he's ready for the right time where his skills, he feels like, are able to challenge you?
00:06:14.000What do you think is the actual hold-up?
00:06:17.000I think it has something to do with top rank and PBC. Oh, okay.
00:07:01.000If the UFC had to work with Bellator and put together some world championship fight, basically, there's so many times you get champion versus champion, they have two different promoters and they have to decide to get together and make this happen.
00:07:17.000If it's going to be on Fox or ESPN and who's going to promote it.
00:07:21.000It's also like when someone like Floyd Mayweather has done what he's done and sold the kind of pay-per-views that he's sold and achieved this sort of level of financial fame as well.
00:07:33.000He's famous not just for being the best boxer, but famous for being...
00:08:54.000Are you talking about brand new people?
00:08:55.000Yeah, even boxers that have been boxing for years that they really don't have the fundamentals down to a T. And you're like, dude, you've been boxing too long for you to still be making the same mistake.
00:09:09.000And it's like, I only can say certain things for so long.
00:09:17.000And then it's just like, alright, I ain't saying it no more.
00:09:19.000Well, yeah, your opinion is as valuable as anybody alive.
00:09:24.000You're one of the best fucking boxers ever.
00:09:26.000You're a beginning boxer, and Terrence Crawford's teaching you something and you're not listening?
00:10:02.000Well, when someone has achieved that level, the level that you have, anybody around you that gets a chance to watch you train and be a part of that, that's gigantic to see something like that in the gym.
00:10:13.000Wouldn't you agree just to see an elite world champion?
00:10:16.000I mean, for just having him around in the gym when he's not even supposed to be training or...
00:10:23.000Just being around and the other fighters around is phenomenal because you see this little extra push in the guys.
00:10:40.000Yeah that's uh do you think about that how much you're inspiring guys?
00:10:45.000Of course all the time that's why I come to the gym when Bomek be like man just take a rest just relax.
00:10:52.000I come to the gym and work out when you know I don't have nothing coming up just so I can show them like even though I'm the champion of the world I still work extra hard to make sure I stay champion because it's harder To keep the championship title than getting there.
00:11:09.000It's one of the more beautiful things about boxing is there's no shortcuts.
00:12:46.000So now when fighters come to my camp or I bring in some sparring partners or some friends that's professional that just want to, you know, come to camp and just experience just being in camp with a world champion, they all say the same thing.
00:13:04.000Man, I thought I was working hard until I came up here, man.
00:13:59.000You know, you in there, you got to control your breathing.
00:14:03.000You know, just holding your hands in certain positions is tiring.
00:14:08.000So, them little muscles that you really not using, you know, in a day-to-day, Yeah, it helps with a bunch of things.
00:14:32.000It's just interesting that more fighters don't adopt it.
00:14:35.000I think anything that makes your body more flexible and increases your range of motion and then gives you strength.
00:14:42.000It feels like when I do yoga, all the connecting stuff, like the shoulders and hips and knees, all that gets this extra stability workout that you don't really get from a lot of other things.
00:14:52.000I feel like it connects everything together good.
00:19:20.000Yeah, and they just always say, alright, well, we get paid for this if we win, this for showing up, this if we get best knockout of the day.
00:20:43.000Because I was doing martial arts back then, and I was watching him going like, that's the ultimate champion.
00:20:49.000That's a champion that puts himself in a terrible place, puts himself down on the cape in the wintertime to do all his training in the cold.
00:20:56.000He runs in the cold, and he runs in combat boots too.
00:21:18.000It's crazy that you say that, because I remember when we was little, we used to always run in the cold.
00:21:25.000I mean, it'd be so cold where the snot is freezing up, you tearing up, but as you get older, you'd be like, man, I ain't about to run in that cold.
00:29:59.000So if you're not monitoring your heart rate or anything like that, you just basically, if you have a flat day, you feel flat, you just chill out.
00:31:31.000He's been training already for eight weeks.
00:31:35.000We've still got one or two more weeks to go before we hit the actual peak point.
00:31:41.000You know, alright, we'll pull back, you know?
00:31:43.000And then sometimes you get hard-headed and say, no, come on, man, let me do a little bit more.
00:31:48.000Alright, do a little bit more, but don't do too much, you know?
00:31:51.000You ain't got to put your all into it, you know?
00:31:53.000Just move around a little bit, you know?
00:31:56.000You got to do basically all fighters like that, especially fighters, good fighters, because most good fighters like Terrence and Other fighters, Jamel Harris, Steve Nelson, you got to pull them guys back.
00:32:10.000You always got to pull them back because they always want to go, go, go, go, go, go.
00:32:13.000Because they always got this win in them.
00:33:45.000My biggest thing that I always told Bo, ever since I was an amateur, because I remember losing a couple of fights because I didn't train as hard and I got tired and I couldn't really do too much.
00:33:59.000And I always told Bo, I said, Bo, if I'm in the best shape that I possibly can be in, nobody beat me.
00:35:45.000When you look at any top fighter, and you look at all the sacrifices they make just to be where they're at, and you have people taking shots at them and stuff, and they'll be like, man, you don't know what I did.
00:36:02.000Or you didn't know what I went through.
00:36:04.000And it's just like total disrespect for somebody that haven't even stepped foot in the ring to be trying to critique you when they ain't even stepped foot to get punched in the face before.
00:36:15.000They can never really understand, though, right?
00:36:17.000No one can ever really understand what it takes to be an elite boxer.
00:36:20.000The future of your family, the future of yourself, your financial success, and all the people around you is dependent on you navigating the most shark-filled waters in professional sports.
00:36:32.000A bunch of train killers with their hands.
00:36:35.000Everybody's real good at knocking other people out with their hands, and you're successfully navigating those waters.
00:36:41.000No one really understands that other than you.
00:41:03.000Because a lot of people, they asked me, because we was in the same trials in 2007. And it was like, do you ever remember Deontay Wilder and the amateurs?
00:41:15.000I said, man, he came out of nowhere cracking people.
00:43:47.000So this whole division now, if you look at the heavyweight division between Andy Ruiz who just beats Anthony Joshua, and then they're going to try to figure out...
00:43:55.000They were going to try to do that in Saudi Arabia, but apparently Andy's like, eh, we're going to fight in America.
00:51:00.000There's teams of people that came up with the eating stunts.
00:51:02.000There were the B-team stunt guys, and then the A-team stunt guys was the first stunt, and then there was the C, which was like the big championship finale thing.
00:54:18.000Because I really wanted to hurt that dude.
00:54:21.000So going into the fight, I got to keep reminding myself, stay calm, relax, don't go in there and do nothing stupid because this is what he wants you to do.
00:55:39.000Now, when you see Errol Spence Jr., does he represent to you one of the best of the up-and-coming guys that are possibly on your radar, at least?
01:01:14.000Nah, but I take my hat off to Pacquiao.
01:01:18.000Do you think it's possible that you could get a crack at him now?
01:01:21.000Because now he's in the hunt right now.
01:01:25.000I wouldn't say so, because I was in the mentions and talked to fight Pacquiao since 2014, and we was in the same promotional company, and they couldn't make it happen.
01:01:38.000Do you think it's because he's not interested in it?
01:01:40.000I don't think he was interested in it because his coach mentioned numerous times he didn't want him to fight me.
01:01:48.000And he wanted him to stay away from me.
01:02:20.000I think Pacquiao spends more money than Floyd on everybody else.
01:02:23.000Oh, that's right, because he's got like 50 people that he just has supported.
01:02:27.000He's an interesting guy, man, because he's so friendly.
01:02:32.000Even when people are trash-talking, he's smiling, and then he gets in that ring.
01:02:36.000kick your ass later different fucking dude once he steps through that rope there's a whole different set of rules he's flying with like keep Thurman talking about how you gonna crucify him and stuff like that and he's just like ooh don't say that yeah and got crucified yeah I wish you the best good luck in the fight good luck good luck in the fight he's a killer Did you know that about Pacquiao?
01:05:48.000I've played a lot of professionals because it's one of the weird sports.
01:05:51.000You can enter into a tournament, and you could be a guy who has a full-time job, and you might wind up matching up with Efren Reyes, who's the greatest player of all time.
01:06:00.000You might meet him in the first round of a tournament.
01:06:03.000All you have to do is pay your fee, and then you pay your entry fee.
01:06:06.000You join in just like everybody else, and you're playing like a world champ, like the Terrence Crawford of Poole.
01:07:13.000Everybody that I know that's an elite, world-class pool player, like Mika Eminen and these kind of guys, you go there, they're at the goddamn pool hall every day.
01:08:51.000Plus, I think those gamblers, when they're around each other all the time, that's all they do is gamble and read signs and check each other out.
01:08:59.000They probably have a highly tuned sense of someone bullshitting.
01:12:25.000Yeah, like 2K. You can't fuck with those kids.
01:12:28.000Those kids that don't have responsibilities, they don't have children, they have nothing but time, they get too good at those goddamn things.
01:12:34.000And you would lose your life trying to chase them.
01:12:38.000So now it gets to the point where I just watched them play.
01:12:43.000So we had this dude named Chance in our house.
01:15:02.000So we want it to be fun at the end of the day.
01:15:05.000Do you have a mental coach or is there anybody you've ever worked with that's like where you've tried to do visualization work or formulate a game plan or is it just go out there and get it done?
01:16:42.000So, do you just sort of go in and get the wheels moving and then just get ready to ramp up?
01:16:48.000Like, how do you determine when you ramp up your training camp?
01:16:51.000Like I say, if you're getting back into training camp now, but you don't know when the fight's going to be scheduled, so how do you approach it in the beginning?
01:16:57.000No, I don't necessarily say I'm getting in training camp right now because I'm not, like, my training camp is six to seven weeks.
01:17:07.000So you're getting ready to get into training camp?
01:17:18.000Now, when you're not in the gym, but you're not training for a fight, are you still doing all the strength and conditioning stuff and everything as well?
01:18:26.000What's amazing about this conversation is if you were a young, up-and-coming boxer in 1982 or something like that and you want to know how Marvin Hagrid did it, there's no podcast.
01:18:36.000There's no Marvin Hagrid breaking down how he does his training camp and talking all about it.
01:18:43.000And I guarantee just listening to you talk about realizing how hard Floyd worked and you working out, you wanted to work out even harder and all the crazy shit you're doing, like people right now lacing up their shoes right now, getting fired up, running out the door, thinking I got to work like Terrence.
01:20:05.000Was there someone that you met when you first met him when you were like, I can't even believe that I'm sitting there with Evander Holyfield or someone like that?
01:20:12.000Someone real famous where you couldn't believe you were actually being around them?
01:24:18.000Well, you know, that's one more thing that's beautiful about you meeting those little kids is that they can realize, like, oh, Terrence Crawford's a man.
01:29:49.000Like there's a certain amount of time in a normal car you feel like you have to go.
01:29:52.000There's a certain amount of time that has to take place before I can get in front of that guy and then get over here and then get to the on-ramp.
01:31:01.000But the thing, shifting with your left foot in the clutch and shifting gears to your right, that's like part of the whole muscle car thing.
01:37:53.000I think when I talk to people about combat sports, one of the things that I always talk about is the difference between the skill level of an elite boxer, when you see that's all they do, versus in MMA. You see openings in MMA that you would never see in boxing.