Five years after he retires from the boxing ring, Manny Pacquiao will become a neighbor of sorts of The Greatest, Muhammad Ali.
They will both be in the International Boxing Hall Of Fame in leafy Canastota, New York, at that point.
But had Ali remained in the tony Hancock Park section of Los Angeles, he and the Pinoy Idol would be actual neighbors now.
I say this because of Filipino news reports about Pacman wife Jinkee getting ready to check out the family?s home purchase in Hancock Park.
Jinkee might do more damage to Megamanny with her shopping proximity to high priced Rodeo Drive in Beverly Hills than any of his recent opponents have done in a fight.
Famed singer Nat King Cole used to live in Hancock Park and Melanie Griffith and Antonio Banderas live or used to live there.
I had the occasion to visit Muhammad once or twice in that big house. This was back when he was married to Veronica Porche, the mother of boxer-actress-model Laila Ali.
If memory serves, the house had been formerly owned by a famous movie star dating back to the 1920s. It might have been huge star Mary Pickford. Either that or Pickford owned a similar house in the tony neighborhood.
I just wanted to add a bit of history to the multimillion dollar property which reports say Manny?s wife Jinkee will soon be visiting and perhaps redecorating. The house is good for Pacman probably both as an investment and a comfortable abode for him when he is training at Coach Roach?s Wild Card Gym in nearby Hollywood.
These days Ali and his fourth wife, Lonnie, reside happily in their mutual hometown of Louisville. Their romance is a storybook one as she was the little girl who grew up down the street from the older Muhammad.
Too bad Ali still isn?t spending time in Hancock Park. I am sure that crime is extremely low there as it is but it would probably drop to below zero if bad guy types realized they might literally run into Ali and Pacman in the vicinity.
I know if I was a burglar I would be sure to skip that neighborhood.
Ali was first married to nightclub singer Sonji who refused to adopt Muslim ways. Then Ali married dutiful Nation Of Islam adherent Belinda Boyd.
It was Belinda who went on a hell hath no fury like a woman scorned mission to Manila when Ali, preparing for his third bout against nemesis Joe Frazier, was cavorting with sultry Veronica.
When Ferdinand and Imelda Marcos complimented Muhammad on the beauty of his `wife? Belinda heard about it in Chicago.
She was on the next plane to the Philippines.
That prompted a whirlwind fight before the classic third bout against Smoking Joe in Araneta.
