Mannys camp was scared to fight Mosley and Cotto in like 2006/2007. They waited till there was obvious decline or in Cottos case taking loaded gloves to the face for 10 rounds and was not the same for a while after that.
This is so fucking inaccurate. When Cotto fought Margarito, Pacquiao had just MOVED UP in weight to
135 pounds from 130 pounds. No one ever thought Pacquiao would ever be a welterweight at that time and never even thought Cotto could ever be a potential opponent. After Pacquiao beat Diaz, Larry Merchant had the crazy idea of Pacquiao fighting Oscar, and then the idea came into a reality. For that fight, Pacquiao only weighed in at 142 pounds, and the thought was it was going to be a one time thing just because it was Oscar and a super fight, and Pacquiao was too small for the division. Immediately after, Pacquiao decided to campaign at 140 pounds and worked out a deal to fight Ricky Hatton. During this time, Cotto fought and beat Jennings and Joshua Clottey.
After Pacquiao destroyed Ricky Hatton, winning the lineal 140 title, Pacquiao was then considering fighting the big named title holders at 147, to win another belt in yet another division. The two options were Shane Mosley who was with Golden Boy and Miguel Cotto who was with Top Rank. The in-house Top Rank fight of Pacquiao vs Cotto was obviously far more lucrative, being that Cotto was, and still probably is, the third biggest name in boxing. The result was a huge success, selling over 1.25 million PPV buys. Given this information, it's quite obvious why Pacquiao vs Cotto made sense and happened when it did (it certainly couldn't have happened any sooner being that Pacquiao was at 130/135 pounds!).
Further, if you're going to use this kind of logic, it should be used against Floyd. Floyd didn't fight Cotto when Cotto was undefeated. Floyd didn't fight Cotto when they were both welterweight champions. Floyd didn't fight Cotto in his prime. Floyd fought Cotto after Cotto had lost to Margarito and Pacquiao, and was considered well past his best days.
The one fight that would and should be used in Floyd's favor is Shane Mosley. Floyd fought Mosley when Mosley was champ and coming off a great win over Margarito. Pacquiao fought Mosley when Mosley was looking like shit and was a total waste of everyone's time. But as far as Pacquiao vs Cotto goes, it was a great win for Pacquiao, one of his best performances of his career and he did so moving up in weight.
Mannys camp also made catch weights to drain Mannys opponents including you guessed it Cotto. You want to be biased fine. Two can play that game.
Cotto wasn't drained losing one pound for Pacquiao. Cotto also has had catchweight fights himself against Margarito II, Sergio Martinez and now Daniel Geale (157). Likewise, Mayweather has had catchweight fights against Marquez and Canelo. It's part of the sport. A one or two pounds is no big deal, anything more is pushing it (157 for Geale is kind of rough, Oscar making Hopkins fight at 157 as well (Hopkins actually weighed 156 just to prove a point)).