I really hate it when a good, clean sport like golf gets dragged down into the sewer with boxing.
I mean boxing knows its place but golf has higher aspirations. In golf they talk about prestige and then money, in boxing we discuss money and then more money.
So I was a trifle gob smacked to read that Oscar De La Hoya, the Golden Golfer, has played some holes in Puerto Rico with Top Rank fighter Miguel Cotto.
Shocked and appalled, I am not. Just a trifle gob smacked. Linking Cotto and Oscar on the links was lawyer and WBO president Paco Valcarcel.
Valcarcel swears the two fighters did not discuss boxing not even for a second as Valcarcel was digging to get out of a bunker.
Isolated by itself, ODLH and Cotto playing golf together is no fistic felony even though Oskie may have promotional designs on Bob Arum’s fighter.
But what if they went further?
What if, at the 19th hole, they even had some sand wedges?
Maybe even BLTs loaded with globs of mayo.
Sorry, just flashing back to Paco pal and pro golfer Chi Chi Rodriguez’s old one liner about being so poor as a kid that he thought a sand wedge was something to eat.
No, I don’t care if the boys had some BLTs and a few cervezas apr?s golf.
I bet Uncle Bob doesn’t care either.
Sure he only has Cotto under contract for the remainder of the year but he is letting Miguel grab a Manny Pacquiao jackpot come Nov. 14.
Arum actually plans a two fer for the Boricua Bomber.
Arum figures that Cotto will be plucky and valiant and all that but will lose to PTP, Prime Time Pacquiao.
Cotto’s slips have been showing lately, most recently against game but overmatched foil Joshua Clottey.
Even if—and this is unlikely–Cotto went out quickly like Ricky Hatton, Top Rank will clean him up and then thrust him into a grudge rematch against Antonio Margacheato early in 2010.
Margarito really has nowhere else to go as his image needs a rehab. Showing he can beat Cotto fair and square can be the vital first part of that effort.
This just in to our Cape Cod studio:
Oskie and Cotto were discussing a remake of Caddyshack.
Valcarcel has turned down the Rodney Dangerfield lead role and Bruce Trampler is being considered for it.
Good thing I didn’t make a molehill out of a sand trap on this.
Playing golf with Cotto doesn’t mean De La Hoya wasn’t getting down with OPP.
Oscar would never, ever, ever tamper with someone else’s fighter.
Pacquiao could tell you that.
And never, ever on the links.
Now a steakhouse, that’s a whole different sand wedge.
