Can Donaire outdo Pacquiao?

" Donaire’s style is absolutely different with Pacquiao, which is enough not to compare him if he’s No. 1 or No. 2. “To be honest, there’s an argument whether he’s No. 1 or No. 2. I see [Donaire] doing things I don’t see many fighters do. He uses his feet first and his hands second. That check hook he threw was incredible. It was a punch I had perfected. I brought that punch to the game and this kid has it down pat solid.”

Can Donaire outdo Pacquiao?

Nonito “The Filipino Flash” Donaire Jr.won’t be just called second best anymore behind compatriot Manny Pacquiao after all.

Even former champion Roy Jones Jr. claimed that Donaire surprisingly caught his attention without a doubt when the Filipino fighter put Fernando Montiel crashing back to earth via solid second round knockout Saturday night at the Mandalay Bay in Las Vegas.

“I saw this kid on TV a couple of years ago and I picked him out then,” said Jones, the long-time pound-for-pound who served as a color analyst for HBO on Saturday.

Jones, in an interview by Yahoo! Sports boxing columnist Kevin Iole, also said the Donaire’s style is absolutely different with Pacquiao, which is enough not to compare him if he’s No. 1 or No. 2.

“To be honest, there’s an argument whether he’s No. 1 or No. 2. I see [Donaire] doing things I don’t see many fighters do. He uses his feet first and his hands second. That check hook he threw was incredible. It was a punch I had perfected. I brought that punch to the game and this kid has it down pat solid.”

Jones, who saw Donaire’s ability to counter-punch Montiel’s blistering throws in the second round, considered the 28-year-old Donaire even before the next best incomparable fighter in the last 10 years.

“This kid, when I saw him on TV a couple of years ago, I told my people he was the next best fighter I had seen in the last 10 years,” said Jones, a future Hall of Famer who held world titles at middleweight, super middleweight, light heavyweight and heavyweight.

“That’s the truth. It was about two, three years ago and that’s how I remembered his name. I said, ‘That’s the best kid coming up I’ve seen in 10 years.’ They didn’t believe it, but I knew it.”
For most boxing fanatics around the world, Donaire’s speed and the strong left hook all over the second round were absolutely the factors that wiped out Montiel, who now fell to 44-3-2 win-loss-draw card with 34 knockouts.

Donaire, who now hiked his record to 26-1 with 18 knockouts, was never threatened. He was faster, he was smarter and he was far more powerful, according to Jones. And Montiel paid the price for playing cocky in the first round.

Donaire raked him with a straight right in the opening moments. About a minute or so later, Donaire ripped him with a left hook that seemed to bother the champion.

Donaire’s tremendous win earned him the world boxing council and world boxing organization bantamweight straps.

Donaire was a longtime flyweight champion—the same division where Pacquiao began his historic run—and also had won an interim junior bantamweight belt. BY JOSEF T. RAMOS