CHICAGO ? Keeping up with Manny Pacquiao?s ring schedule is like tracking the love chart of a playboy who dates a handful of hot chicks without us or the girls really knowing whom among them is going to eventually stride down the altar of commitment.
PacMan last saw action in May, when he fought to a questionable draw with Juan Manuel Marquez. Since then, the only thing active in Manny?s camp are the press releases about his managers? expiring contracts, speculations on his next foe, his training or lack thereof, his billiards tournament participation, et cetera.
But who really cares if PacMan is managed by someone else, or that the GenSan native can sink an 8-ball with his eyes closed? What the boxing-crazed Pinoy nation truly wants is to see its national hero put on those leather gloves again and wreak havoc in the featherweight division, hit someone, and hit him really hard.
And that brings me to my point: Who is Pacquiao?s next victim, and will the Pinoy sensation ever fight again before the year ends?
Sadly, we don?t know. The latest report came from Quinito Henson of the Philippine Star, who wrote that ?Thai veteran Fahsan 3-K Battery, a former World Boxing Federation bantamweight titlist, looms as Pacquiao?s next foe in a non-title bout here on Dec.4.?
If you?re a PacMan fan increasingly worried about your idol?s accumulating ring rust, don?t heave a sigh of relief just yet. The operative word in Henson?s report is ?looms,? meaning to say the Thai hasn?t signed up yet and that ?negotiations are being finalized to bring Fahsan to Manila.?
Sun.Star Cebu correspondent Michael Limpag once wrote me about Pacquiao?s fight situation being ?Muddy, very muddy.?
Of course, Mike is right. Here?s hoping that PacMan?s handlers can clear some of the air.
