Pac-Man the Destroyer is an Explosive Force in and Out of the Ring

You can be the best technical boxer in the world and die a poor man. Everyone who follows the sport, whatever their love of the art, craves excitement; the fighters who provide it, through the weight of punch or personality, are the ones who make the big money, and are the real kings of the ring. Now boxing has a showman to withstand comparison to the best: Manny 'Pac-Man' Pacquaio, a little Fillipino who lives fast and hits even faster.

You can always gauge a fighter's box-office worth by the number of good boxers who want to share a ring with him. Amir Khan wants to fight the Pac-Man at lightweight. Ricky Hatton wants to fight him at light-welterweight. As it stands, Khan is likely to get to him first, but both British boxers see the four-weight champion as the sort of opponent who can get them seriously interested - and considerably richer than they already are. The three of them know they are good for each other, and good for boxing.

So what makes Pacquaio special? In a word, style. He is a gregarious, larger-than-life character, adored in his own country and in the United States for his two-fisted, near-manic performances against the best opponents at and around nine-stone: Latino heroes such as Marco Antonio Barrera, Erik Morales and Juan Manuel Marquez. Only Hatton among incomers, on his doomed quest to unseat Floyd Mayweather Jr last year, has generated as much interest in the tight-knit American boxing market.

And that is why Pacquaio is making such a buzz: he delivers. The fight game is slowly relearning some of its old habits - like the best fighting the best. This is not out of any concern for the fans or the legacy of the sport, but an admission by TV moguls and promoters that professional boxing is losing its luster. For years, TV, with the limp co-operation of the sanctioning bodies, has pandered to the tactics of rival matchmakers, whose overriding concern has been to keep their star money-earners apart until they could no longer credibly do so. Since the most recent, and hopefully final, retirement of Mayweather, Pacquaio has inherited the mantle of the best fighter in the world, pound for pound. It is an accolade worth more than any bestowed by the rogues who have done so much over the past couple of decades to rob boxing of what little credibility it ever had. And the mark of a genuine champion now is his willingness to move outside his comfort zone, to take on opponents bigger and more powerful than himself.

Tomorrow night in Las Vegas, at the Mandalay Bay casino, Pacquaio moves up from super-featherweight to challenge the tough Chicagoan David Diaz, who holds the World Boxing Council's lightweight title. It is a proper fight, not one with a given result. Pacquaio, whose intensity has dimmed ever so slightly in recent performances, might even lose, but he relishes the risk. It is why fans love him. He dodges nobody.

Nor can he say no to entreaties of another kind. His American trainer, Freddie Roach, was not entirely happy that Pacquaio left his arrival in Vegas as late as he did. Nor will he have been pleased with reports that his fighter preferred to indulge himself in scuba diving as well as socializing with his friend, General Alexander Yano, who is the new Chief of Staff of the Armed Forces of the Philippines. Pacquaio is no stranger to casinos, either, and finds it hard to resist the adoration of his compatriots. He is a genuine people's champion in a country where pleasures are taken freely.

That said, he should beat Diaz, even though, at 29 and after 13 years as a professional, there is a suspicion he is on he slide. His last fight, a split-decision over Marquez in March, wasn't convincing and he hasn't stopped anyone since he survived a war with the little-known Jorge Solis in Texas last year, putting his man away in the eighth after sustaining a bad cut. Solis said later, "My wife hits harder."

Not many of his other 34 opponents who failed to reach the finish have dissed him like that. Morales, the great brawler, outpointed him over 12 rounds at 9st 4lb in 2005, was then stopped in the 12th and, in the rubber match two years ago, went out in three. Barrera, who so brutally finished off Naseem Hamed as a world force, went in with Pacquaio twice, stopped in the 11th round in 2003 and losing unanimously on points last October. All acknowledged his greatness.

Pac-Man has avoided nobody. From the day he won his first world title, at flyweight 10 years ago, he has taken on the best. It is why he deserves respect - and every dollar that comes his way.

British boxing fans should be cheering for him tomorrow night because a meeting with Khan or Hatton down the road would be a treat indeed.