If there should be a trilogy in the fabled Pacquiao-Marquez fight, let it be.This is one clash the world has been waiting for with giddiness as in the wait for the news about Osama bin Laden finally being “taken down.” Among all of Pacquiao’s last 14 victims since he lost to Erik Morales in their first of three fights in 2005, it was Marquez who gave hell to Pacman. But before that, Pacquiao gave Morales hell in their last two fights in 2006, knocking out El Terrible in the 10th in their second fight and stopping Erik in the third round of their third and last bout in November of that year. And in the 2008 Pacquiao- Marquez fight, Pacman was lucky to snatch a win by the slimmest of margins: split decision. In that war of brutal proportions, Pacquiao and Marquez had banged away at each other as though they were fighting for the last woman alive. In that contest of will, guts and guile, they’d thrown some of the hardest punches in boxing and nobody blinked, attesting to the duo’s superb condition in the tradition of the gladiators in the Roman Empire era.

And their 2004 encounter was no different. In that extremely memorable bout, Pacquiao knocked Marquez down three times in the first round. If it were a movie, it could be acartoon. Even the villain couldn’t be disposed of that easily. You knock down a foe once and he gets up, fine. You knock down a foe twice and he gets up twice, fine. But three times you knock down a foe and he gets up thrice—in the same round at that—you still call that fine?

A tough nut to crack. Tough as nails. Unknockable as Muhammad Ali during his prime. Marquez was all that in their mayhem of a May fight, a day before GMA won the 2004 presidential derby against the late, lamented Fernando Poe Jr. And today, Pacquiao and Marquez are being pitted against each other again. Because the first fight was a draw and the second ended in a split decision, a deciding third only seemed logical. For practically begging to have this third fight, Marquez, reportedly getting a “pittance fee” of $5 million, can’t complain if he sees Pacquiao receiving no less than $15M. As the saying goes, beggars can’t be choosers.

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