They’ve stopped wondering whom Manny Pacquiao will fight next, or when. Little do Pinoy adorers of their boxing superhero know that Sen. Pacquiao is engaged in a bigger and more significant battle.
Out in the city wet market sports hub, they’ve finally taken note of the Triple G, what kind of an unbeaten warrior Gennady Golovkin is, what stuff he’s made of. It’s of course odd that majority of our boxing aficionados have started to manifest interest in the Kazakh prizefight hero only after his knockout win streak of 23 met an abrupt end at Madison Square Garden in New York last Saturday.
Golovkin still eked out a unanimous decision win, after allowing Daniel Jacobs, an awful underdog, to take him all the way to the 12th round of the world welterweight unification championship.
Marketplace boxing fans were however one in saying the Golovkin they saw in the delayed telecast of the world welterweight championship on Sunday appeared average, slow and predictable. (“Mabagal, walang kwenta.”)
Meanwhile, last heard of, Sen. Pacquiao was up fighting grimly for his pet bill, the creation of a Philippine Boxing Commission, out in the Senate.
Those trying to shoot down the Pacquiao bill were insisting that there would be duplicity because there’s already a supervising body in boxing, namely the Games and Amusements Board (GAB), under the Office of the President.
For the record though, GAB has been sorely remiss in supervising, protecting and developing professional boxing in the country.
The GAB has reportedly taken measures to reform its impotent boxing division following the takeover of Abraham Mitra, a former congressman, as GAB chair.
Based on reports from the Senate, Pacquiao had received a pummeling from a former Senate president, who expertly drove home the point of duplicity during his interpellation of the only boxing champion senator in the world.
Pacquiao may or may not win this fight. But with or without a national boxing commission, what’s truly imperative is for a competent and dedicated group of tested and incorruptible authorities to run professional boxing in the country.
This is the main point Pacquiao has been fighting for. He can’t afford to lose now, going by the sorry, sinful manner prizefighting is being run in the country.