Pacquiao's trainer Roach believes in exploiting De La Hoya's weaknesses

Don’t be too quick to belittle Oscar De La Hoya for taking next month’s fight with the noticeably smaller Manny Pacquiao. The driving force behind the match is Pacquiao’s trainer, Freddie Roach, who briefly trained De La Hoya and is convinced Pacquiao should beat his much taller opponent in the welterweight bout Dec. 6.

Roach has been particularly visible and audible this week. Notably, you’ve probably read about or heard Freddie discussing the jab factor. De La Hoya’s jab ceased to be a factor in the second half of his 2007 megafight with Floyd Mayweather, and Roach says he knows why. “It was a mistake Oscar made, and I know the mistake and I know it well, and we will take advantage of it. It’s how I’m going to take the jab away from him.”

That’s crucial against De La Hoya, who is left-handed but fights in an orthodox stance. If De La Hoya can’t jab effectively, Roach thinks his left hook would become his only weapon. Although De La Hoya’s right, which might as well have been a flipper early in his career, has become more effective, Roach still does not respect it. “I tried to improve the right hand,” Freddie told me last week during my visit to his gym in Hollywood, but “it was ineffective in the Mayweather fight.”

Not that Roach, or current De La Hoya trainer Nacho Beristain, is overlooking the right cross. “I’m sure Nacho is working on the right hand because (Juan Manuel) Marquez had success with the right against Manny,’’ Roach said, referring to two bouts that ended in a draw and a narrow decision favoring Pacquiao.

The tactics probably include the lead right, which Roach said is common strategy against a southpaw like Pacquiao. He added quickly that it’s just as common for the left-hander to throw a lead left against a right-hander, a tactic Pernell Whitaker used against De La Hoya in their 1997 bout. “We’ve been watching that fight a lot on tape, to be honest with you,” Roach said. As the trainer’s confidence grows, “that’s one of the key fights.”

De La Hoya did narrowly win that bout, and now he has a more formidable right hand, even if it isn’t as strong as Roach tried to make it. But Roach doesn’t think De La Hoya is better now, at 35 and fighting infrequently, than he was a decade ago. “I really don’t think he’s improved since then,” Roach said. “I think he’s gone the other way. I think with age we all get old and our reflexes get slower. It’s just part of life.”

FIGHT NIGHT AT THE TANK THURSDAY: With Manny and Roach plugging away in Los Angeles,  younger brother Bobby Pacquiao is in San Jose to head a seven-bout card at HP Pavilion, and he’s brought a couple of stablemates.

The card includes Daly City super-middleweight Karim Mayfield (6-0-1, 5 knockouts), whose opponent has a surname this site wouldn't publish and is 2-5-1, and Salinas welterweight Eric Garcia (2-0-1), who might be tested against Geoffery Spruiell (7-6, 2 knockouts). Heavily tattooed San Francisco super middleweight Jason Peterson (2-1) is also on the card.

With all due respect to those guys and Bobby Pacquiao (29-14-1, 14 knockouts), who fights Robert Frankel (25-9-1, 4 knockouts) in a lightweight bout, the most intriguing matches on the card are the two women’s bouts, and not just because all four women seemed mighty attractive in street clothes at Wednesday’s weigh-in at the Tank.

Gloria Salas, weighing 103 pounds, will have a tough time in her pro debut in the opening four-rounder. Her 106-pound opponent, Melissa McCorrow (1-0), is trained by former San Mateo bantamweight Eddie Croft.

But the real attraction is a six-rounder involving a Roach-trained fighter, Chika Nakamura (7-0, 3 knockouts), against Tiffany Junot (4-1, 3 knockouts) at 135 pounds. Nakamura is a  statuesque native of Japan whose glamour rivals that of Leila Ali. If she isn’t as charismatic as Manny Pacquiao, she comes close.