It’s becoming obvious that Manny Pacquiao’s mind is no longer focused on the ring. His trainer, Freddie Roach, who sees the Filipino boxing icon up close and who has become like a father to him since he took him and turned him into the world’s greatest boxer, has been saying this since the start of Pacquiao’s training for Saturday’s super welterweight bout with Mexico’s Antonio Margarito.
In an interview on “60 Minutes” on Sunday, Roach said Pacquiao is too distracted by his new job as a congressman. “I’m worried about it. Yes. I’m walking around at 2 in the morning. Something is not right and we are not preparing the way we should for this fight.”
In an earlier interview with BBC World Service, Roach hinted boxing is losing its grip on Pacquiao, “We are going to lose Manny Pacquiao to politics, for sure.”
“After the first couple of days of training, Manny came up to me and said ‘I miss my job’ and I said “you’re at your b job,’ and he said ‘no, I miss Congress,” Roach told BBC.
Pacquiao admitted to “60 Minutes” correspondent Bob Simon that his priorities have changed since being elected to office. “I already achieved my goals in boxing, my dreams in boxing. What I want to achieve more is in public service. I want to be a champion there,” he said.
Having said that, Pacquiao is probably thinking of hanging his gloves after the Margarito fight. I think he should. After all, a victory on Saturday would not only give him an unprecedented eight titles in eight different weight divisions, a record that may not be broken in his lifetime, but would also fortify his standing as the greatest pound-for-pound boxer ever, and arguably the greatest boxer ever.
As he said, there is nothing more to prove. Why go the way of Oscar de la Hoya, whose outstanding career was all but obliterated by the brutal beating he got from Pacquiao in what was obviously his last fight?
Pacquiao is arguably still at the peak of his career, but with all the distractions of politics, show business, wealth and fame, he could suffer the same fate as De la Hoya from a rising young boxer. And all the blazing victories would all be but blurred memories of his great career, and what would remain imprinted in the people’s mind would be the terrible beating he got from that new boxing star, just as boxing fans retain only that image of De la Hoya’s battered face and gloomy face.
He’s got hundreds of millions of pesos in the bank and in numerous assets in the Philippines and in the United States, a wealth that would make his life and those of his family more than comfortable for the rest of their lives. He has proven himself as one of the greatest, if not the greatest, boxer of all time.
And he was right when he honestly said “me, of course” when asked who he thought was the greatest boxer ever by Simon. His manager Bob Arum, when asked the same question, said Pacquiao is the best boxer he has ever been associated with, including the great Muhammad Ali. “Yes, he is, because Ali was essentially a one-handed fighter,” Arum said.
Emmanuel Steward, one of the best trainers around who has handled legendary boxers such as Thomas Hearns, Julio Cesar Chavez, Evander Holyfield, Lennox Lewis and Wilfred Benitez, is awed by Pacquiao’s willingness to fight the best, “a quality that endears him to both fight fans and the boxing media.”
“To me, Pacquiao is a real phenomenon,” Steward said. “It’s that he is so small and how he performs against the bigger men, all of them tough.” Steward is amazed that a natural lightweight like Pacquiao is now dominating the welterweights and now fighting as a junior middleweight.
Pacquiao was right, and many boxing experts would agree that he has nothing more to prove in boxing. He should hang up his gloves and let that impression remain there forever.
Besides, it’s unfair for both boxing fans and his constituents in Saranggani if he continues to divide his time between boxing and Congress. If he wants to continue fighting, he has to give up politics. If he wants to become a successful politician and public servant, he should give up boxing.
The people of Saranggani cannot afford not to have representation in Congress for months on end just because he is training for a fight. Boxing fans, on the other hand, wouldn’t want to see him on the ring not on his top form because he had to attend to politics half of the time.
Retire, Manny and enjoy your millions. Retire and focus on your political career, where you have much, much more to prove before you can call yourself a champion public servant.
But even in your retirement, I’ll join millions of fans who will ask you to come out and fight Floyd Mayweather Jr. to settle once and for all who’s the greatest pound-for-pound ever. That blabbermouth should be taught a lesson or two on humility. Maybe a battered face and a devastating defeat would teach him to be magnanimous in victory and gracious in defeat.
If Mayweather continues to whine and make excuses, then ignore him and stay retired. He will go down in history as the fighter who remained undefeated because he refused to fight the greatest.
And Margarito? I know you’re not worried about him. So why should we?