Fresh off an impressive seventh-round knockout over Lucas Matthysse at April, Manny”Pac-Man” Pacquiao is back in action on January 19 at the MGM Grand Garden Arena in Las Vegas, Nevada, defending his WBA welterweight title taking on Adrien”The Problem” Broner.

Broner, 29, is coming off a wild majority draw decision contrary to Jessie Vargas in April and can be a +250 underdog in this fight with Pacquiao, 40, coming back as a -325 favorite.

Odds Analysis
This is the third straight fight where Broner has been an underdog, formerly closing at +150 vs Jessie Vargas and +900 against Mikey Garcia. Meanwhile, Pacquiao was a favored in each of the past four fights, falling just to Jeff Horn in July of 2017 during that interval. Pac-Man’s knockout over Lucas Matthysse last July was his first T/KO victory since he finished Miguel Cotto in 2009 at the same arena he is fighting Broner in.

For Broner, this is the third largest return to welterweight, a class in which every one of his three livelihood losses have come. It is not surprising to see Pacquiao as the favored in -300 as he is a future Hall of Famer and is coming off an impressive knockout. Broner had a good deal of hype behind him a few years back but was plagued with legal problems and has failed to live up to expectations.

Pacquiao making a case to get a rematch vs Mayweather?
Pacquiao (-325) is a eight-division world winner and for a while he was rated as the best pound-for-pound boxer in the world, with tremendous heart and thunderous hitting power. The 40-year-old has won three of his last four fights, including his aforementioned knockout over Lucas Matthysse in July, his first playoff success since November 2009 from Miguel Cotto.

The southpaw was pumped out by Juan Manuel Marquez in 2012 for the first back-to-back shedding slide of his career after falling to Timothy Bradley six months prior. However, because the weight loss loss, Pac-Man is 6-2 with his only losses coming against Floyd Mayweather Jr. and Jeff Horn (in contentious fashion), both by unanimous decision. He also outstruck Horn 182-92 while putting 32 percentage of his cries to just 15 percent by Horn — that is boxing judges for you.

Broner needs to be concentrated to beat Pacquiao
Broner (+250) has all of the makings of an elite fighter but his career has been marred by out-of-competition antics that have gotten him in legal issues. Most recently, the 29-year-old was booked on a misdemeanor sexual battery charge from February 2018. The Problem fights a defensive style, somewhat emulating Floyd Mayweather Jr., and was drawing some comparisons during his rise through the rankings, for example his split-decision success over Paulie Malignaggi in 2013. The Ohio native also has had issues with his attention, it seems, appearing quite pedestrian against Mikey Garcia at 2017, but he looked much better in his majority draw Jessie Vargas in 2018.

Against Vargas, Broner used a second-half battle strategy, losing the first six rounds but winning the last six. He had been outstruck 203-194 but gained 38 percentage of his punches to Vargas’ 24 percent. The Problem does have power in his hands, like his counterpart, as he managed to knock Shawn Porter down in their bout in 2015, a struggle that Porter won through unanimous decision. The knockdown was Broner’s only bright spot of this bout.

Read more: