In the Squared Circle: My Two Cents!

Published on: 20th January, 2010

After Thomas Hauser posted his great piece on steroids, their place in boxing and the collapse of Mayweather-Pacquiao on MaxBoxing.com, it isn’t a surprise that there really isn’t much more to say about the botched fight between both claimants for the pound for pound king title. (To read Hauser’s piece, please click HERE).

Despite Hauser’s thorough piece, I feel compelled to throw in my two cents. If I didn’t, then I would be a boxing writer, would I?

I, like many, began clamoring for the proposed bout between “Money” an “Pacman” as soon as Cotto touched the canvas for the first time in his losing effort against the Filipino Firestorm. The fact that negotiating talks began so soon after actually left me shocked. What really boggled my mind was the ease in which both sides, Bob Arum of Top Rank soliciting for Pacquiao while Richard Schaefer of Golden Boy Promotions did for Mayweather, reached agreements in the purse split, the billing and even the penalty for going over the contracted weight (Ten million dollars per pound or fraction there of).

When the negotiations hit a glitch with the venue, I thought “If that was the worse it was going to come to, not bad.” But what came next was unbelievable.

Mayweather’s demand of Olympic-style testing for a man who had never had come even close to failing a drug test was not only appalling but down right evil. As a firm believer in “innocent until proven guilty”, there is no viable argument in my eyes of why Pacquiao should take those tests. The argument that if Pacquaio “has nothing to hide then he should just take the tests” is ludicrous. L-U-D-I-C-R-O-U-S.

Why? Why? Why? WHY?!?

Why should Pacquiao take a test that in no way, shape or form, per his past actions, call for him to take? Because Floyd Mayweather and his entourage deems it so? Because Paulie Malignaggi said so? Because there is $40 Million at stake? I think that at this point Pacquiao is of no need or want for money. That he has proven that his principles are worth more than 4 with seven zeros attached to it.

The fact that Mayweather has agreed to be tested in the same manner is not reason enough to think less of Pacquaio’s refusal. Mayweather’s agreement of the testing is a means to an end. He knows he is clean. I am sure he knows that Pacquaio is clean, too. Mr Hauser notes in his piece that Pacuqiao as well as Mayweather have fought in the same weight classes from the ages of 16 to now, 106lbs.-150lbs. As you get older, you gain weight. For most of us to prove this true, all we have to look at is that area between our chest and our waist. For Pacquaio as well as Mayweather, who are considered two of the hardest working men in their trade, their weight gain turned into muscle.

So why call for such testing? Because it gives Mayweather an out, plain and simple and Mayweather got it.

Now Pacquiao, in a typical Pacquiao move, takes on the tough Joshua Clottey on March 13th at Cowboy Stadium in Dallas, TX, while Mayweather sits on the sidelines like that gorgeous girl in high school whose demands for a limo and a way too fancy dinner made her prom date go for the more homely but but more accommodating girl for that special night.

Floyd Mayweather Jr. and Richard Schaefer

The one that I feel the most sorry for in this whole debacle is not Pacquaio whose name has been soiled but Richard Schaefer. In the times that I have read his quotes or actually heard him speak with his eloquent swedish accent in person, Schaefer comes off as a very intelligent and successful business man. In this case, as Mayweather’s representative in the negotiations with Top Rank, Schaefer was left to make logic out of Floyd’s illogical demands.

Through the press, Schaefer was reminded how when Judah asked for known steroid user Shane Mosley to be tested before their proposed fight some years back, Schaefer stated that the Golden Boy partner would only succumb to the tests which the NSAC asked for. Arum agreed to do just that for Mayweather-Pacquiao but Schaefer refused.

When Pacquiao stated that he did not like his blood to be drawn, Schaefer offered the HBO 24/7 footage of when Pacquaio was administered his pre-fight medical for his Hatton bout and his blood was drawn. Schaefer claimed that the footage was from two weeks prior to the bout but the medical results were from twenty-four days before.

In other words, Schaefer was made to look like a buffoon.

Now, if Pacquiao just happens to come up positive for any steroid use, after this diatribe, I would join that club….

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