FREDDIE Roach loved to bark about the impossibility of a reshaped, reinvented Timothy Bradley ever showing up in Las Vegas on April 9. Roach was trying to make it clear Bradley would revert to his old shy, stammering self once Manny Pacquiao unloads and lands his bombs.
Log under the buzzsaw, Roach readily sliced back after the Bradley camp bragged about a secret weapon tightly labeled “Log in the Ocean” by trainer Teddy Atlas.
Roach would never hesitate to overplay Bradley’s supposed built-in inferiority.
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Now, it has also become unclear how and why Roach has suddenly changed his tune.
Remember how Roach would insist that Bradley could never hope to change or improve under the tutorship of the respected and credentialed Teddy Atlas?
“We’ve got to prepare for the best of Tim Bradley,” Roach announced in a surprising turnaround.
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Puzzling as Roach has turned, Bradley has proven to be a big puzzle himself.
A big, powerful riddle, if you please.
Claiming he had to cut down on road work, having hit peak form more than a week ahead, Bradley showed up for his weekend media workout terribly overweight.
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Bradley tipped the scales in his Palm Springs camp at 153 pounds, six over the 147 welterweight limit.
On the other hand, Pacquiao weighed a famished 141 lb the same day at Wild Card Gym in Hollywood.
It was unclear if Bradley had allowed himself to be this big in past welterweight encounters, a full week before the big battle.
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You see, Bradley has supposedly been retooled, but he definitely would be needing extra lightness to keep up and avoid the blazing assaults of his mythical foe, an eight-division world title winner.
By the way, while Bradley, together with trainer Atlas, had made it known they would not be pushing for a knockout, latest feed from the Bradley camp has changed perception.
Bradley did not announce outright they would also go for a knockout.
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However, Atlas said they would be silly not to try the weapon Juan Manuel Marquez threw in stopping Pacquiao cold in 2012.
“We would be fools not to get that info and see how it’s done,” Atlas admitted.
Bradley, who was made to try the trick inside one round before mediamen, himself kept mum.
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He would not say it but, deep in his heart, Bradley knows that, if it had been quite hard to outpoint Pacquiao, trying to stop his fabled foe would definitely amount to going through hell.
Bradley must make no mistakes, behave like a perfect robot—even as he also tries to be unpredictable at the same time.
Or is poor Mr. Bradley himself getting puzzled at the phantom tricks he’s being made to perform?