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Perhaps no athlete has faced as much scrutiny recently as Tennessee Titans' troubled cornerback Adam (Pacman) Jones.
But as boxing's super PacMan gets ready for his bout this weekend in San Antonio against Jorge Solis on Top Rank's "Blaze of Glory" pay-per-view card, Manny Pacquiao himself has had quite a chaotic stretch himself.
You won't see him on any police blotters. He didn't "make it rain" at any Las Vegas strip clubs, or allegedly cause a commotion during NBA All-Star weekend, and he doesn't face any suspensions or time behind bars.
But as Justin Fortune -- who is currently training Pacquiao while Freddie Roach is in Puerto Rico working with Oscar De La Hoya -- puts it, this PacMan [as it's spelled at the top of Pacquiao's Web site] has been in the midst of "organized chaos."
Go back to the last summer as Pacquiao arrived in Los Angeles to begin preparations for his rubbermatch with Erik Morales. He would be intercepted by Oscar De La Hoya at LAX and lured into signing a promotional contract with Golden Boy Promotions with the enticement of a "golden" suitcase filled with twenties setting off a tug-of-war that sparked litigation from both Golden Boy and Bob Arum's Top Rank, which believed their bout agreement for the third "El Terrible" bout prohibited Pacquiao from signing any other agreement.
In the "cold war" between Top Rank and Golden Boy, this was the "Filipino Missile Crisis."
By the week of that fight in mid-November, rumors were rampant that Pacquiao would renounce his deal with Golden Boy and attempt to return his bonus money back to De La Hoya's company, which summarily rejected the offer. After his destruction of Morales that night, he would pledge his allegiance to Arum as they announced a promotional partnership.
But this story was far from over. As December rolled around, factions representing both of the arch rivals hovered around Pacquiao as he celebrated his birthday back home. Everyone jockeyed for face time with the Filipino icon, who had been known to be fickle in the past.
Eventually, it was Arum, once again, who would win the loyalty (at least for now) of Pacquiao.
In return, Golden Boy would arrange a bout between Juan Manuel Marquez and Marco Antonio Barrera (taking away two options for Arum and Pacquiao) and with more legal filings, they scared off HBO from televising his next bout. After initial plans to stage Pacquiao's upcoming bout in Macau, Arum would put up his own dime to stage this card at the Alamodome.
Eric Jamison/AP Photo
Manny Pacquiao leads an extraordinary life outside of the ring.
In between all this, Pacquiao made his intentions clear that he would be running for political office back home, a move that for some reason was not universally accepted from his normally rabid, idolatrous following.
But outside of that, nothing much has really gone on in the life of Pacquiao.
"The last five months I've been busy in the Philippines," he would tell MaxBoxing, in a bit of an understatement. "I'm busy, but I have time to practice everyday."
After numerous delays, Pacquiao finally would find his way back to the States less than a month before his bout. For his other fights, he spent around eight weeks to prepare for outings, leading many to question his conditioning and focus coming into the Solis bout.
"Before I came here I already trained a month in the Philippines and I'm very focused on this fight," he said. "Some people don't think I'm focused on this fight but the reality, the truth is, I'm very focused on this fight and I trained hard. This is a very important fight for me."
Fortune admitted to being concerned with what he'd have to work with given Pacquiao's relative tardiness in migrating to the Wild Card Boxing Club. But he's also been pleasantly surprised by what he's seen.
"Yeah, both," Fortune said. "Because he's in the Philippines we really don't know what's going on. He says he's training. So when he came here, he was halfway through. So for us it was to bring him up that 50 percent, like we're doing now. Not to push him over, it's a fine line in keeping him right where we want him."
Unlike for the Oscar Larios bout last summer, Pacquiao came in much better condition to the States. His cut physique shows a fighter who is physically fit, but you wonder if he'll have a post-Morales letdown given the surrounding circumstances.
"He's shown us no signs of any sort of distractions outside of boxing. He likes organized chaos," says Fortune. "I think this is a good release for him. He comes to the gym, he doesn't have any distractions whatsoever. He lets it out, he takes it out on the sparring partners and training."
When asked about his relationship with Top Rank and the surrounding drama, Pacquiao said: "As of now, I know there is a case from Top Rank and Golden Boy. But I don't want to comment on that. What I'm going to do is focus on the fight."
Since he made that pronouncement two weeks ago, another motion by Golden Boy to block this fight was dismissed in court. But it didn't seem like he gave Top Rank a ringing endorsement as you read various reports from his homeland of the error he made in giving his John Hancock to Top Rank.
But Arum is emphatic in his belief that he has a content client.
"There's no question, he's very, very happy," said Arum on March 21 at a media day in Los Angeles to promote this event.
"Now, you've got to understand what happens in the Philippines, here's how you do the landscape because everything has an agenda. There are two big television networks, one is ABS-CBN and the other is Solar. Solar is more like an HBO-type of thing. And they're aligned now with an over-the-air channel, I forget the name. Now, they were both competing in the Philippines for the rights to Manny's fights. ABS has had the rights for the last two, three years. Now, Manny in his wisdom -- because it was his call -- made the deal with Solar, which gave him a lot of money.
AP Photo/Bullit Marquez
When he's not focusing on his fight with Jorge Solis, Manny Pacquiao is nurturing a political campaign in his home country of the Philippines.
"So ABS, they have writers, Ronnie Nathalaniesz, who works for ABS and writes for the Manila Standard, so now he does the party line. So now they wrote in the papers about Richard Schaefer seeking an injunction to stop the fight. Well, with all due respect, he filed those papers a month ago. And we've already had a hearing. So why did they come out with that now? Because Solar and its people are busy selling the commercials. So it's, 'Oh, they're not going to have it!"
So wait, this is all just Pacquiao propaganda? No, it can't be.
"It's all propaganda!" said Arum, laughing loudly. "So when that happens, the guys who work for Solar, they have a rebuttal."
This is like the Democrats and Republicans.
"It's worse than that. It's like ABC and CBS fighting over things."
(Or boxing Web sites)
Later that day in March, Golden Boy's initial attempt to get this fight halted was rejected. This past week, their appeal was also denied.
"The bizarre thing is they're battling for Manny Pacquiao on one hand and trying to stop him from fighting on the other hand," said Arum this past Friday afternoon at the Wild Card, where a media day was conducted for Pacquiao. "Look, the only thing I can say about Golden Boy is that you're dealing with a situation where you're not dealing with boxing people. Not dealing with people that know how to deal in boxing. This would never happen with a Don King.
"I mean, Don King, he claimed we took Julio Cesar Chavez when we did Chavez and De La Hoya. He went into court, it was over in a week. And then he continued his suit against us for damages. But the fight went on -- and he was rooting for the fight to be successful because he felt that if he won the lawsuit, there would be more money."
So will there be any more last-ditch efforts to get Pacquiao off this upcoming card?
"Who the hell knows with them," answered Arum. "I mean they dream up crazy stuff. But if they don't mind getting their s --- kicked out of them, which is embarrassing, the last thing they did after they were denied their injunction, they went to the court of appeals for the ninth circuit asking for an emergency appeal and you should see how they got dismissed -- by three judges. I mean, what are they looking for?"
At the Wild Card, Top Rank publicist Bill Caplan would hand out the actual political campaign poster for Pacquiao's run for congressman in General Santos City, and buttons that read "Vote for Manny." It's not as catchy as "I Like Ike" but you get the point.
But it was interesting to hear about the backlash that Pacquiao received for his political aspirations. Perhaps his followers believe that anything that takes away from his boxing -- which made him the national treasure he is and has given the Philippines an international presence they can be proud of -- is something to be avoided and put aside till after he walks away from the ring.
But Pacquiao the politician is undaunted. When asked for his platform, he said, "First of all, to help poor people because there are a lot of poor people in my place."
And after his date with Solis, he's back on the campaign trail.
"After the fight I have to go back to Gen San to the Philippines to focus on my other fight."
For more "organized chaos."
