MANNY PACQUIAO was piqued when told about the statements made by Marco Antonio Barrera and his promoter, Oscar dela Hoya, moments after Barrera?s thrilling win over Erik Morales at the MGM Grand in Las Vegas.
“Hindi lang nila matanggap na tinalo ko siya (Barrera),” said Pacquiao, in response to remarks made by Barrera and Dela Hoya during the post-fight chat with HBO boxing analyst Larry Merchant.
“It was one of those nights where a lot of things were involved,” said Barrera with the aid of an interpreter when asked about that night in Nov. 2003 in San Antonio, Texas, when Pacquiao mauled him so bad almost everyone thought he would no longer fight again.
Dela Hoya, who heads the Golden Boy Promotions, said he knew that the Pacquiao loss was just a fluke.
“It was not him (Barrera) in there (against Pacquiao). I knew he still has a lot left in him. It is just a matter of focus and concentration,” Dela Hoya told Merchant.
Barrera said the California wildfires that forced him to abandon his training camp in the mountains of Big Bear, as well as his former manager?s decision to leak to the media that he had undergone a brain operation that was unreported, contributed to the stunning defeat to Pacquiao.
Pacquiao, however, was left clueless about the fight because he failed to watch it having decided to stay in his farm where satellite TV was not available.
Because of this, he could not give an assessment of Barrera who now has won the last two of his three fights with Morales and arranging perhaps another showdown with Pacquiao sometime next year.
Pacquiao, however, must first beat Fashan 3K Battery on Dec. 11, and then do the same to Juan Manuel Marquez before hoping to meet Barrera and prove to the doubters, like Della Hoya, that his win against his boy was no fluke.
Pacquiao is currently training under the watchful eyes of American trainer Freddie Roach at the Almendras Gym in Davao.
They are flying back to Manila on Thursday night in time for the next day?s meeting with top-of-the-line executives of Smart Communications, the telecom firm that is bankrolling the multi-million peso slugfest dubbed Yanig sa Taguig.
