DENVER EN ROUTE TO DALLAS?All the photos, all the video and my own in person observation at his Oxnard, California, training camp leave me quite disturbed about Antonio Margarito.
Why, I must ask, is ?Margacheato Bandido? so often seen laughing and grinning Stepin Fetchit style for the cameras?
Check me on the dated cultural reference and make this hamming it up like the great Mexican funnyman, Cantinflas.
What is so amusing, so funny?
Is there anything humorous about having to get into the Cowboys Stadium ring this Saturday night against the fearsome, at or nearing his positive peak Pacman?
See story which says 54 of Pacquiao’s Congressional colleagues are flocking to Texas for his big fight.
Bottom line, is the caught in the act handwrap cheater laughing at us or with us?
See bubbly Pacquiao thinking he will persistently, consistently beat Slow Mo Margo to the punch and mentioning how open the Mexican fighter is when he unleashes uppercuts.
Margarito was booked to attend a tamale festival as one of his first official acts since landing in the Metroplex area and booking into the Gaylord Texan Hotel, quarters he will share with Pacquiao and about 200 or so of Manny’s closest (?) friends who will fly in from LA on the rented ?Air Pacquiao? flight Monday.
Not that I remain suspicious about how many times now banned from the USA trainer Javier Capetillo and Margarito cheated on their wraps without getting nabbed but if I was at the tamale event, let’s just say I would probing my food for any elements of that plaster like substance the pair planned to whack Sugar Shane Mosley with.
There’s not enough habanero or jalapeno or any kind of hot sauce in the world to hide the fact (suspected fact?) that when they loaded the handwraps illegally in that dressing room at the Staples Center, well, it wasn’t their first rodeo.
Margarito went into the ring that night shaken and understandably so.
He wasn’t sure they would let him fight, let him get paid and let him leave the Staples Center without being handcuffed inside an LAPD car and being whisked to Central Booking.
It should not be forgotten historically that boxer Luis Resto and trainer Carlos “Panama” Lewis, accused of removing all the horsehair padding from Resto’s gloves when he thumped Irish Billy Collins, wound up doing state prison time and getting what has amounted to lifetime bans from boxing for their misdeeds.
I doubt the amenities at Central Booking compare with the plush confines of the Gaylord Texan although, come to think of it when I was at the somewhat spherical hotel for the Clottey non-fight in March, I did not notice a ?halal menu? which I’m sure is de rigeur for prisons in LA.
Perhaps, now with Capetillo limited to plying his trade only in Mexico with no questions asked there, Margarito is laughing all the way to the bank.
He fights Manny, he loses but tries hard and maybe avoids a Ricky Hatton pancake pulverizing finish and goes back to Tijuana with something close to $2 million.
It’s all part of Bob Arum’s lavish, Frequent Fighter Program.
Do you know how many tamales you can get in TJ with that kind of loot?
It’s all risk/reward. Margarito was taking the risk of cheating against Mosley, he got caught and now he gets his reward.
Life is not fair, this we know. Evildoers can prosper.
And I guess we know why Margarito keeps chuckling.
He’s clowning the boxing world…again.
And, why not, when we deserve it?
