Manny Pacquiao faces a dilemma.
Despite never failing a drug test, the Pacman has been requested – make that demanded – by Floyd Mayweather Jr.’s team, along with Golden Boy Promotions, to submit to an extensive random drug testing program. The stakes are high. Not only could Pacquiao miss out on the biggest fight and payday of his career, but his image and legacy could suffer a damaging hit.
Thanks to a few bad apples – alright more than a few – any outstanding athletic performance in today’s sporting world immediately is viewed as suspicious. Whether it’s hitting home runs at a record breaking level, or running faster than anyone ever has, or knocking people senseless, the public has been given reason to be skeptical of the very best.
Naturally, the sporting world has taken steps to satisfy the public’s demand for a level playing field.
The Nevada State Athletic Commission conducts urine tests after every fight. But given the scheduled nature of these tests, their value is certainly less than the tests conducted by other organizations.
Major League Baseball have responded to concerns over their sports legitimacy by instituting random urine tests to detect drug use. Given the drop in home run totals, it appears to be working.
The Olympics have had drug testing in place for many years, and their current system is more thorough than any sports league or athletic commission’s testing policies. Not just random urine tests, but blood tests – in order to detect HGH (the value of which is up for debate) – as well. This is the procedure that the Mayweather team is insisting Pacquiao submit to.
Bob Arum has made a counter proposal, which includes random urine tests, but not random blood tests. Freddie Roach has gone on record as saying he would be fine with random blood tests, but not within 48-72 hours before the fight.
A seemingly reasonable compromise – especially from Roach – but according to what’s been reported, the Maweather team is not budging. They are insisting on the Olympic style testing done by USDA, and the USDA will not compromise by altering their procedures. That means no blood testing cut-off a few days before the fight.
Some have suggested that Mayweather is just trying to get under Pacquiao’s skin. Gamesmanship, it’s called. But given the remarks Mayweather Sr. has made, it appears the Mayweather side just don’t believe Pacquiao is going about his work honestly.
Manny Pacquiao has shown a level of greatness so beyond what we’re used to seeing, that they just don’t buy it. They believe what we’re seeing is TOO good. Impossibly good.
Mayweather’s team is not alone in their suspicions.
One neutral observer that has expressed his doubts is Paulie Malignaggi.
In his comments made public after the Cotto bout, in questioning the veracity of Pacquiao’s performance, he brought up the sport’s history claiming that nobody has ever done what Pacquiao is doing… and surely if Pacquiao’s the first to do so, alarm bells should be ringing?
According to Malignaggi, “Over the course of history, have you ever seen anybody go up in weight and get stronger and knock people out… nobody in the course of history has ever been able to do that.”
There’s a problem with that argument though. It’s not true.
Sugar Ray Robinson won the golden gloves as an 18 year old featherweight. Two years later, he was a professional lightweight, beating the likes of Sammy Angott and Henry Armstrong. The following year, Robinson stopped welterweight Fritzie Zivic. Impressive stuff, but it’s what Robinson did past his prime at middleweight that was truly remarkable, as he recorded one punch knock-outs out Rocky Graziano, Bobo Olson and the steel jawed Gene Fulmer.
Robinson’s not the only past great that kept knocking out world class opponents as he moved up.
Archie Moore turned pro as a 19 year old welterweight. At age 29, he was knocking out high quality fighters like Holman Williams (161 pounds) and Lloyd Marshall (166). The following year, weighing in at 174 and giving away 10 pounds in weight, Moore knocked out Hall of Famer Jimmy Bivins (184). Moore didn’t stop there, eventually moving up to heavyweight, where at the age of 45 he knocked out 211 pound and #3 ranking heavyweight Alejandro Lavorante.
Okay, so smaller men can move up and knock out bigger men.
That wasn’t Malignaggi’s only point however. He was also skeptical of Pacquiao’s ability to take Cotto’s best shots.
The best example of a smaller fighter, handling himself against naturally bigger men is Henry Armstrong, a fighter that Pacquiao has been compared to. Perhaps Armstrong’s most impressive performance in this regard was his welterweight defence against big punching Ceferino Garcia.
When Armstrong faced off against Garcia, there was a belief he had bitten off more than he could chew. Armstrong had handled a game Lou Ambers at 135 pounds, and had blasted Barney Ross at welterweight. Ross however was a former lightweight, and not a big puncher. Armstrong management even tried to get Garcia to come down in weight, initially asking for the bout at 142 pounds. That request was not granted, and Armstrong went into the bout as the underdog with the experts believing his grinding, face first style wouldn’t stand up to Garcia’s size and power.
The experts were wrong.
Weighing 134 pounds to Garcia’s 146 1/2, Armstrong tore after the big punching Filipino and was in his chest from the opening bell. There were a couple rough spots when Armstrong was hammered with clean bombs, but he took them all, and kept coming and at the end of night walked away with a unanimous decision win.
The following year, Garcia would go on to knock-out top middleweights Lloyd Marshall and Fred Apostoli. But he couldn’t dent Armstrong.
Clearly what Manny Pacquiao is doing is not impossible. Fighters have done it before, and they’ve done it before the boxing world had heard of anabolic steroids or human growth hormone.
Unfortunately, it doesn’t matter to his critics, who despite the historical examples,hold firm to the belief that what we’re seeing is too good.
The same way that it doesn’t matter that there isn’t a shred of evidence against him.
Due to the public hysteria over performance enhancing drugs, the skeptics are not interested in a lack of evidence, they want proof of innocence.
And without sufficient proof of innocence, there will always be people pointing fingers and trying to tear Pacquiao’s accomplishments down. Those people are even louder today than they were last week, and should the fight fall through, will be even louder.
His team likely feels that their counter proposal is more than fair and that Mayweather’s team has no right to push them around. They might be correct, but if this fight falls through, there are many that won’t see it that way.
They will hold Pacquiao to blame… and rightfully or wrongfully, they will point to this as Pacquiao running away from his chance to set the record straight.
If a compromise can’t be worked out, walking away might not be an option.
There’s too much to lose.
More than just the money.
