THAT’S how Last Rounder Glenn Ramos puts it, and I don’t think I could have done any better. Glenn, who was at ringside during the World Cup of Boxing, was again gracious enough to share with us his thoughts.
According to Glenn, Diosdado “Prince” Gabi dished out a classic boxing clinic and that Michael Domingo forgot his role as a “traditional sacrificial lamb for a protected undefeated prospect to pad his record, and is now a serious threat at a regional belt in his division.”
Amen to that dude.
Gabi and Domingo demonstrated how deep and talent-laden our team was. Ditto with AJ Banal. Glenn is confident that AJ “will give the ALA stable its first world title belt.”
MAKE MINE GERRY. When I got the call from my editor asking me to cover one of the six bouts, without hesitation, I volunteered to write about the Pe?alosa-Gonzales fight.
As soon as the fight started, I immediately opened a new Word document on my laptop and groped around for a filename.
“Gerry is the man again” I called it. I could always change it later, if all doesn’t go well, I figured.
It turned out to be prophetic.
After Johnny Gonzales was counted out and Gerry was humping the canvas in ecstasy, I felt my eyes become moist. I closed the document with the prophetic filename for editing later, and proceeded to howl like a madman.
UNDERDOG. Gerry is the quintessential Pinoy underdog. He’s small, quiet, and unassuming. He doesn’t have bulging muscles and the fact that he is considered “old” by boxing standards completes the picture.
He has been there, done that. He’s won plenty and lost some. Had he not been given the chance to fight Gonzales, he could well have opted to retire and his legacy as one of the greatest Filipinos ever to lace on boxing gloves would have been secure.
But Gerry had one more big fight in him. He knew that he still had what it took to become a world champion once more. And he got plenty of confirmation in the Ponce de Leon fight.
Though he lost that fight on the scorecards, many ring observers and fight fans, (this writer included) thought he had done enough to deserve the victory over the younger, bigger, and stronger champion who had previously knocked out 28 of his 31 opponents.
Luckily for Gerry, he was given that once in a lifetime opportunity against Jhonny Gonzales.
One more thing. Some internet writers have called Gerry’s punch to the liver a lucky shot. It pains me to rebuke them but no, it wasn’t a lucky shot.
Watch the replay and you will see Gerry deftly duck and move to his left to avoid the right cross from Gonzales, putting him in a perfect position to throw that left hook to the latter’s undefended, unguarded ribs.
It’s a move perfected and honed through years of experience. It requires skill, perfect timing and deadly precision.
A lucky shot is when you close your eyes and throw a haymaker hoping you will hit something. Go ask Antonio Tarver it. Not Gerry Pe?alosa.
E-MAIL Reacting to my last column entitled “Is Bautista our Vargas?” Last Rounder Theodore Ramos e-mailed me to share his thoughts. According to Theodore, it’s very difficult to make a fighter apply what his coach tells him:
“Coachable..yup that’s the right term… Here comes the hardest part—the fighter. Factors inherent individually within each of them. The character. The ability to listen, practice and apply. Manny is Manny, Nonito is Nonito and Czar is Czar.
Different inherent characters. They all can listen and practice but can they all apply (what they learned)?”
QUOTE OF THE DAY. “Jhonny doesn’t have a scar on his face. He made a mistake in not protecting himself, enabling Pe?alosa to land that ‘one in a million shot.’”—Oswaldo Kuchle, manager of Jhonny Gonzales.
THE LAST ROUND. It is on the hardworking Baseline Gym trainers Charlo Salimbagat and Toto Sayaboc. Cheers!
