"I think Marcos has a chance to be competitive. I think Marcos is underrated in some ways. I think he's not just a brawler; he's a guy with a pretty good jab and stuff like that, but I don't know balance-wise he's the same way," stated former welterweight champion Paulie Malignaggi, who shared his thoughts on the eagerly-anticipated May 3 showdown between undefeated pound-for-pound king Floyd "Money" Mayweather and WBA welterweight champion Marcos Maidana. According to Malignaggi, although Maidana may not be the most fundamentally sound fighter, his unorthodox style and his punching power may be enough for his trainer, Robert Garcia, to come up with an effective game plan that could potentially give Mayweather some problems.
"I'll give you an example. Like Cotto has a heavy, good jab and Cotto was able to trouble Floyd with that good jab. He's a heavy puncher, but there was also a heavy jab. I think Marcos has a heavy jab, but I don't know if he has the fundamentals that Miguel Cotto has. I think Cotto was able to give Floyd some trouble because the fundamentals behind the physical kind of fight that he fights were pretty strong. He has strong fundamentals. Marcos, I'm not going to say it's a weakness that he doesn't have great fundamentals. That might be his strength in a way because his ability to be unorthodox, you know, a lot of times makes him land punches that you don't expect him to land," Malignaggi explained during a recent conversation with FightHype.com. "But this is Floyd Mayweather now and punches you don't expect to land, they usually don't land on a guy like that. So it's a tough situation. It's a guy with two-handed power; Marcos can knock you out with either hand. He goes to the body. He does use the jab pretty effectively more now than he did before; he's kind of mixed it into his own style. He's not going to have a jab like mine, but he mixes a heavy jab into his own style. There's things to work with. It's up to him and his trainer, Rob Garcia, to put a package together that may trouble Floyd. There's things he has to work with, but it's not an easy task for sure."
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