While on a long overdue visit to my mum in my far flung childhood town of Tubajon, Surigao del Norte in Dinagat Island, Philippines, I had to restrain myself from getting surprised. The reason is that Manny Pacquiao is well known even in this remote town where electricity is available only from 4:00 PM to 12:00 AM. While a household or two might use a power generator to get a fight telecast at daytime (which is night time in the US), almost all would miss seeing a Manny Pacquiao fight live. So who else does not know who Manny Pacquiao is?
With his speed, power and punch, fighting style, Manny Pacquiao, to the fighters in his weight classes, is the boss. For the same fight qualities and attitude, Manny Pacquiao, to his worldwide fight fans, is boss (just ask the Paclanders and you’ll know if you don’t as of yet).
A recent occurrence catapulted Manny to that higher level of being a Boss all the other Philippine fighters could only dream of.
I’m referring to the change of his manager. In the Philippine setting, a fighter’s manager is unquestionably the boss. The fighter is beholden to his manager who provides him board and lodging, gives him an expense allowance, spends for his training and gives him fights. The boss hires and fires fighters. Even those fighters who have exhibited bright potentials to excel further and could already command signing bonuses during managerial contract renewal periods look up to the manager as boss.
Manny Pacquiao has lived this life, struggled in silence in recent years to be in control of his life as a fighter, and, in the midst of his deep training for the Erik Morales super-mega fight, got his wish granted. This wish came true in the form of manager, Shelly Finkel.
“New” in the sense that this manager knows and acknowledges that, in his relationship with Manny, he is not the boss and that Manny is. This is “new” to a Filipino fighter – a manager who looks after the welfare of the fighter who is his boss and who has the power to hire and fire him. No wonder Manny confesses that now he is happy. He was quoted exulting that now he can concentrate more on what he does best, fighting.
This “improvement” in Manny’s mental condition, being free of the past worries that he could have been previously financially shortchanged, should translate tremendously in terms of focus on the fight at hand. In this sense, Marco Antonio Barrera, who claimed to have been bothered by a lot of distractions to which he attributed his devastating loss to the Pac-Man, was in a better position fighting Manny than Erik.
Marco Antonio was fighting a distracted Manny Pacquiao at the time he claimed it was not he who was fighting. Whether or not Manny was indeed financially shortchanged in his previous fights is irrelevant. The point is Manny was distracted that he was.
Then, he was not the boss. Now Manny is. Everybody, this includes my town mates in far flung Dinagat Island and the others in the more than 7,000 islands in the Philippines and elsewhere around the world who love boxing, know who Manny is. Having reached that level – being boss to a manager – where the other Filipino fighters could now strive to attain, Manny Pacquiao is the Big Boss.
