LAS VEGAS – As Floyd Mayweather Jr. was doing interviews after his grand arrival at the MGM Grand here Tuesday (Wednesday in Manila), Alex Ariza was quietly sitting a few seats from across the stage.
A couple of foreign reporters approached him, and he started chatting with them.
But when a Filipino scribe closed in and tried to join the chat, Ariza motioned his hand, as if to stop the reporter, and went back to talking with one of the writers, a veteran boxing columnist writing for a UK-based daily.
The STAR/Philstar.com also tried to get an interview with the man who used to be Manny Pacquiao’s strength and conditioning coach but got the same treatment as the first Filipino sportswriter.
“Hey, sorry man,” Ariza said. “No interviews.”
After working on Pacquiao’s conditioning for a few fights, Ariza has transferred to the camp of Floyd Mayweather Jr. for the same job title. He’s had a bitter fallout with Pacquiao’s trainer Freddie Roach and was welcomed with open arms by Mayweather.
He has now been preparing Mayweather as the latter puts his undefeated record on the line against Pacquiao at the MGM Grand Garden Arena on Saturday (Sunday in Manila). And Ariza looks convinced that he has done his job.
Ariza recently told mlive.com’s David Mayo his observation of Pacquiao, saying the Filipino icon did much more than he needed to while preparing for weeks against Mayweather at Roach’s Wild Card Gym in Los Angeles.
“Overtrained,” Ariza told Mayo. “It’s not a good look.”
He just won’t discuss it in detail with Filipino scribes.
