“Sometimes scorers of fights are incompetent. Sometimes they are more than incompetent, they are corrupt…..The bottom line is if you are an honest man…Pacquiao won that fight….It’s an injustice to the sport, it’s an injustice to the fighters and an injustice to the fan base,” commented well respected ESPN boxing commentator Teddy Atlas.
Practically every credible boxing analyst who commented on the fight echoed the same sentiments as Atlas including those from Sports Illustrated magazine, BBC Sports, International Herald Tribune, etc. Other well-known TV commentators like Larry Merchant, Emmanuel Steward and Harold Lederman, were unanimous in their opinion: Pacquiao definitely won the fight. Former champion Oscar de la Hoya wants Bradley to give the championship belt back to Pacquiao. Heavyweight great Lennox Lewis said “the fight was not even close.”
Las Vegas is America’s Babylon — the glitzy gambling capital of the world which puts a smile on the devil’s face — a place where churchgoing husbands and frugal housewives go crazy and gamble their meager family savings away, where runaway teens from the burbs sell their bodies for a song, where mob rule reigns supreme. “What happens in Vegas stays in Vegas,” is the city’s tourism line. True enough. The surrounding desert sometimes yields mangled bodies which stayed.
The word in Vegas these days is: “The fix was on in the Pacquiao-Bradley fight.”
Some complain that the horrid fight decision was the result of incompetent judges. But no one who has seen the fight and scored it the way the judges did can be that incompetent. One has to be a moron to do so. That three judges are morons is possible but not probable. So more likely than not, Teddy Atlas’ corruption allegation applies.
Even the judge who scored the fight for Pacquiao looks suspicious. He scored it 115-113. Clearly, Pacquiao won by a very wide margin and this judge made it appear like a very close fight like the others who also scored the fight 115-113 for Bradley. Commentator Harold Lederman scored it eleven rounds Pacquiao, one round Bradley.
The judges couldn’t score it unanimously for Bradley as that would make the fix too obvious. So all of them appeared to have conspired to make it look like a close fight. By scoring it that way, the psychology involved is that some of those who watched would begin to doubt what their eyes had seen — of Bradley’s face smashing repeatedly against Pacquiao’s fist.
Like any savvy streetwise journalist, Atlas knows the score. Boxing matches can be fixed and sometimes are. He smells a rat whose stink reaches into the heavens. The decision has all the elements of a fix.
Consider the thoughtless statements of Duane Ford, the 86 year old judge who voted for Bradley. In defending his decision, he said that he did not think Pacquiao did enough to win the fight.
When confronted with the stats that Pacquiao landed 190 power punches whereas Bradley landed only 108 and further, that Pacquiao landed a total of 253 out of 751 punches and Bradley was 159 of 839 – Ford’s lame excuse was: “I don’t look at punch stats but I saw Manny miss a lot of punches and Bradley hit Manny and win a lot of the exchanges….I thought Bradley gave Pacquiao a boxing lesson.”
What a joke. Ford’s credibility with these statements is negative zero. What he is saying is contrary to what millions of viewers saw and what Compubox is saying. The silent uncompromising purely objective machine witness cannot lie.
And pray, what is an 86 year old man doing judging a contest which requires a judge who can view and score the hits of fists that have the speed of lightning. Is it possible that he did not think Pacquiao did not do enough because his 86 year old eyes did not see Pacquiao’s flash punches? Who put this fossil there? That alone sounds fishy.
The judges’ shameless decisions are indefensible. And what happened to the unwritten but good rule that if you are the challenger, you have to demonstrably show that you deserve to be the new champion by either knocking out the champion or absolutely dominating the fight. There was nothing of that sort here shown by Bradley who was like an amateur compared to Pacquiao.
In his comments, Atlas seems to suggest that somehow Arum was involved in this fix suggesting that there is word that Pacquiao’s contract with Arum is about to end and Pacquiao wants out and that when something like that is afoot, something happens.
Arum on the other hand condemned the judges’ decisions and called for an investigation but at the same time admitted that decisions are almost always never reversed unless the winning boxer is discovered using drugs. Arum and just about everybody else is undoubtedly saying – and justifiably so – that the fix was on.
Whether Arum is putting on an act in calling for an investigation to veer suspicion away from him, only Arum knows. Let’s hope not. But if he is serious, his demands should probably not be limited to mere pro forma words. He should make the investigation a reality. Clear up the dirt in boxing once and for all and do humanity a service. Pacquiao, who may really be sincerely trying to be a saint – can help in that effort. It’s going to be a major endeavor requiring the help of the Feds but why not now? A businessman and a potential saint combination to clean up a major Vegas operation? Highly unlikely but anything is possible.
Was Pacquiao involved in this fix as some are claiming?
That’s not the case as he actually won the fight. If he was involved, he would just have allowed Bradley to punch him silly.
How about Bradley?
Equally innocent. He just happened to be a lucky pawn.
Did Pacquiao lose anything in this fight?
In reality, Pacquiao does not lose anything but gains. He suffers no loss of prestige because everybody knows he won. He also does not need to look for another opponent as Bradley is ready made for the November rematch. A third fight may even be possible if the fight which Pacquiao will win is close enough. So, he actually earns more money.
The situation also provides perfect timing for the Mayweather Pacquiao trilogy which starts next year – a fitting finale for Pacquiao and Mayweather’s retirement with both amassing tons of green.
How about the bright boys who manipulated this scandalous Bradley win?
Aside from the quantum returns from their investment in controlling the system and sure bets, the satisfaction of seeing their creative thoughts become a reality will be there for them to relish for a long time – at least until the next project.
How about the boxing fans?
Well, they know that they were hoodwinked. They may cry to the heavens, shout bloody murder and complain much. But they also know they are willing suckers entertained by and addicted to a blood sport like the Romans of old cheering for the Christians or the lions. They’ll be there for the next fight and the next after that….
Note: The California State Bar honors Atty. Ted Laguatan as one of only 29 lawyers officially certified continuously for more than 20 years as Expert-Specialists in Immigration Law and the only Filipino lawyer who has achieved that distinction. Email laguatanlaw@gmail.com Tel 650 991-1154 Address: 455 Hickey Blvd. Suite 516, Daly City Cal 94015