I’m still terribly pissed off by it and won’t let go of it without a, well, fight.
There’s a glimmer of light amid all the gloom.
One is Ring Ratings’ decision to leave the rankings of the fighters as they were before Timothy Bradley “won” against Manny Pacquiao. The standings were: Pacquiao and Floyd Mayweather were tied at No. 2 (no No. 1), with Pacquiao ahead of Bradley at 147 lb. Ring Ratings had a number of options after the fight, but decided in an unprecedented move to retain the ratings.
Its reasoning was this: “Pacquiao outclassed Bradley even if Ross and Ford didn’t see it…. To take the opposite approach would be giving tacit approval to a shameful performance by the judges.” Doug Fischer, editor of RingTV.com trenchantly said, “I don’t think Pacquiao should be punished because of two dumb-ass judges. He dominated an undefeated pound-for-pound-rated fighter in his prime.”
Two is that the WBO will act on Bob Arum’s complaint and review the fight. WBO president Francisco Valcarcel announced this last week, saying five “’recognized international judges’’ will conduct that review and make a recommendation. Arum has been vociferous about the unbelievable result, a fact that many see as an effort on his part to distance himself from suspicion he had a hand in it.
The Nevada Athletic Commission has been throwing obstacles in that path, pretty much agreeing with Duane Ford’s assessment that “I thought Bradley gave Pacquiao a boxing lesson, I thought a lot of the rounds were close.’’ A thing belied by the highlights, all of which belonged to Pacquiao and none to Bradley. Earlier, the same judge argued that judging a fight is not like judging “American Idol,” which includes audience participation. Which insulted all the wire services and boxing organizations who all, or nearly all, had Pacquiao winning the fight, the least of them by seven points. If only for utter blindness, never mind an induced one, Ford and C.J. Ross should be banned for life from any sport.
“It puts boxing in a very horrible light,” said Arum. “If the commission in Nevada will be intransigent, and won’t cooperate, we have to have a federal commission. We have to examine who these are on the commission, how they got there, how they operate. Something is broke.’’
There are problems there, however. Valcarcel himself added when he announced the review that the WBO does not doubt the ability of the judges. And while the review will look into the correctness of the judging, it will not look into the crookedness of the judges. And the review is not expected to result in drastic sanctions. What it is likely to do is find a mistake that, however egregious, is an honest one, and order a rematch.
Is one in order such as many quarters, even in this country, have demanded?
Not at all.
Nothing short of the decision being reversed will do for us. A rematch merely sanctifies the crime. It’s exactly the same thing as changing the rankings of the fighters. It will give tacit approval to a shameful performance by the judges. It will allow Ford and Ross to go free. No, more than that, it will allow them to profit from their misdeed.
First reverse the decision, then have a rematch. Or since Bradley never won the fight, give him another crack at the title. Or since all that depends on what other options Pacquiao has—Juan Manuel Marquez is waiting at the wings, and there’s always retirement to consider—consider giving him another crack at the title.
If ever we need to be united on anything, we need to be united on this. What pisses me off in particular is the world’s, both boxing and nonboxing, inability, despite shrill calls for a review, to be pissed off by this. Articles on it continue to call the decision controversial. Durant being fouled by LeBron as he drove to the basket in the dying seconds of Game 2 is controversial. Hitler being evil is not. Pacquiao giving Bradley a boxing lesson is not.
And some have been patronizing about our outrage, dishing out amused barbs about our exaggerated sense of wounded pride. Well, it’s not about nationality, stupid, it’s about justice. It’s not about pride, morons, it’s about fairness.
My own unsolicited advice is that if the decision isn’t reversed, Pacquiao should retire. At the very least, it should punish those who conspired and continue to conspire in saying “pakyu” to Pacquiao and to the world by depriving them of one of their juiciest cash cows, from whom they have obtained wealth beyond their wildest greed. No other fighter today, except for Mayweather, commands the kind of attention, and money, Pacquiao does. It should also put pressure on the boxing world to treat Las Vegas like a pariah. That’s a paradise for organized crime. It will be on the head of its officials if its unemployment—now the worst in the United States—worsens even further.
At the very most, a better ending could not have been scripted for Pacman. He has nothing more to prove, he is universally seen as the winner of that fight, “dominating an undefeated pound-for-pound-rated fighter in his prime”; he has added moral high ground to his title. The last is the one thing that has escaped him all these years, little helped by his comments on Obama’s gay-marriage policy. He has it now, having shown tremendous class throughout all this, remaining above the fray, leaving the frenetic disputation of Bradley’s victory to the public. Despite the result, he is on top of the world. Despite his seeming loss, he has become triumphant in ways he wasn’t before. Despite the apparent tarnishing of his name, he has become champion in every sense of the word.
Not a bad place from where to go.