CELEBRATED trainer Freddie Roach, who has earned the respect and confidence of Filipino ring idol Manny Pacquiao, says the Filipino ring icon is upset at everybody, including manager Shelly Finkel, the fighter’s lawyer Franklin Gacal and confidant Wakee Salud over the lawsuit filed by his management team against Gacal and Salud.
Roach told well-known boxing writer Brad Cooney that Gacal and Salud had Pacquiao sign a contract without going through Finkel and Pacquiao was “upset about that.”
The trainer said the lawsuit was “a little distraction right now and it’s something we don’t need.”
He said that the parties involved would meet and hopefully everything will be straightened out.
Prior to leaving for Los Angeles and then proceeding to New York to watch Bobby Pacquiao’s fight against Kevin Kelley at New York’s Madison Square Garden, Salud told Viva Sports/Standard Today he was informed that Finkel and lawyers Nick Kahn and Keith Davidson were “already preparing a case against Pacquiao.”
Salud said Pacquiao reacted by saying he would “fight the case because I am used to this.”
However, Finkel in an e-mail wrote, “against the advice of our lawyers, we would not sue Manny.”
Finkel said he learned that Salud was arriving in Los Angeles and would like to meet with the management team “to settle everything. We would be open to that.”
In the lawsuit filed in a Los Angeles Superior Court, the plaintiffs noted that without getting the written permission of his management team, as required under his contract, Pacquiao signed an agreement with giant Philippine broadcast network ABS-CBN.
Finkel’s team also stated that in the agreement, Pacquiao granted ABS-CBN a 60-day right of first negotiation for future fights, which they claimed “harms plaintiffs’ ability to negotiate for the highest fees for Pacquiao’s future fights.”
