Although we're now 12 days removed from Manny Pacquiao's shocking and controversial decision loss to Timothy Bradley, the fallout of Bradley's dubious victory is still going strong. On Wednesday, Kevin Iole of Yahoo Sports reported that the World Boxing Organization, the sanctioning body whose welterweight title Bradley won, selected five judges to watch the fight and score it as they would, and all five scored the June 9 scrap for Pacquiao.
Two of the five anonymous (but apparently well known and well respected) judges scored the fight 117-111, one had it 118-110, one 116-112 and another 115-113. On the night of the fight, judges C.J. Ross and Duane Ford both scored the bout 115-113 to Bradley, while Jerry Roth had it in favor of Pacquiao 115-113. Myself, scoring the fight over at SBNation Los Angeles, had it 118-110 for the Filipino star.
Bob Arum, who runs Top Rank - the promotional company for both Pacquiao and Bradley - isn't backing off his stance that the state of Nevada should conduct an investigation to see if there was any wrongdoing, which many cynical sports and boxing fans alike believe happened. As with most major title fights, a rematch clause was built into the contract had Bradley won, and many think the fix was in so Top Rank could schedule the rematch and sell two fights instead of one.
Nov. 10 is the date set for a potential rematch, but there's no guarantee it happens. Arum says it's up to Pacquiao, who may seek a fourth fight with Mexico's Juan Manuel Marquez. Pacquiao is 2-0-1 in the past three bouts against Marquez, although all three have been close and many believe that Marquez won their last match in November of 2011.
Of course, there's always the scant possibility that Pacquiao and Floyd Mayweather Jr. finally agree to a super fight, although there are the same road blocks that have existed for the better part of three years, and then some. Mayweather is currently in the middle of serving 87 days in prison on a domestic battery charge. Additionally, Pacquiao's loss certainly takes a lot of the luster off the fight, despite it being still the biggest fight boxing could make by a wide margin.