Fallout from the Antonio Margarito situation continues and it is probably still worth delving into a few points on the radioactive matter. However, barring any significant developments, this will be the penultimate post on The Cruelest Sport concerning the Margarito controversy. There are some reductive folks out there who might consider these comments a “defense” of Margarito and of the status quo. But they are merely attempts to provide context, something rare in boxing coverage, and to make the simple point that opinions—both informed and uninformed—are not truths.
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The silliest argument against Pacquiao-Margarito is that Margarito does not “deserve” a junior middleweight title shot. Not many fighters deserve the championship belts they wear and even fewer deserve to contest them. That people still expect some kind of order from corrupt sanctioning bodies is remarkable in itself, but ignoring years upon years of title belt shenanigans to bolster half-thought theories is self-serving at best, flat out ignorance at worst.
Does Shannon Briggs deserve his forthcoming title shot? How about Enrique Ornelas? Did Paul Briggs, afflicted with some mysterious disease and out of the ring for three years, deserve his shot at Danny Green? Did Juan Manuel Marquez deserve his welterweight title fight against Floyd Mayweather Jr? Did Victoria Cisneros—incredibly, pulled out of the crowd at the last moment and allowed to fight without any screening—deserve to fight Holly Holm? How about this one: did Margarito deserve his last shot at a junior middleweight title against Daniel Santos in 2004?
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Tim Starks at The Queensberry Rules made an eloquent case against the rising tide of venom over Margarito a few days ago and also made a few points on licensing in general and professional regulatory procedures. (Starks, because of his concise and reasoned tone, becomes the de facto voice on The Cruelest Sport for the Anti-Margarito crowd. Disclosure: I have contributed to The Queensberry Rules in the past and will do so in the future; disagreement does not always have to be rancorous and divisive. Nor does it have to degenerate into name calling and cyberbullying.) But there seems to be a point about professional disciplinary action–and how it plays into the Margarito case–that some appear to be overlooking.
Any professional—lawyer, doctor, architect, accountant, etc.—is subject to the standards of his profession. In case of some kind of lapse or violation, a professional goes before a panel (in New York it is the New York State Board of Regents, for example) and a ruling is made on the case. The “accused” is suspended, censured, fined, debarred—what have you. But a ruling is made. The point here is that Margarito has already gone through the justice system of professional boxing—such as it is. Should there be a more stringent standard? Of course. Should there be a centralized governing force in boxing? Of course. Until then, however, rulings are made on a state-by-state basis with some check from the Muhammad Ali Act. No star chamber, impromptu tribunal, or deux ex machina is suddenly going to materialize and banish Antonio Margarito to Upper Kvetchnya.
Margarito was free to pursue a license in whatever state would hand him one. This decree had the imprimatur of the Association of Boxing Commissions. Whenever some sort of regulatory SNAFU comes up in boxing, the ABC is invoked as an arbiter or final word, sometimes by comparison and sometimes by actual deed. The fact remains that Margarito went through the only channels available to regain his license, and all the squawking in the wake of his receiving it cannot take away from the simple fact that this issue is as settled as anything in boxing ever is.
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Some of the points put forth by the “Anti-Margarito” contingent are understandable: that Margarito does not deserve a major payday because he will be, in essence, profiting off of his misdeeds, that Margarito should have been suspended longer or barred altogether, and that Top Rank is cynically awry in trying to profit on this controversy, but the newest line of thought is beyond the pale. This line of thinking besmirches Manny Pacquiao for taking the fight and calls on him to play proxy judge and jury for the disenchanted boxing fans disgusted by Margarito and the lack of regulatory oversight in boxing.
Now the moral arbitrators not only insist that athletic commissions, municipal organizations, consumers, and promoters follow their upstanding examples, but they also practically demand that the athletes themselves kowtow. Manny Pacquiao is a professional prizefighter—one of the best to come along in decades—and not St. Francis of Assisi. Yes, he is a unique boxer–his standing as a Congressman attests to this–but his decisions in boxing are motivated by professional dictates (and, yes, this includes money). Never mind the fact that for years Pacquiao fans—calling them a zealous bunch would be an understatement–have been excoriated for deifying Pacquiao. Now we have a slew of writers calling for him to be some sort of saint and to set a moral standard for others to follow. It is hard to say whether or not this is a new high or new low in absurdity. And the fact that Pacquiao said he believes Margarito knew his gloves were loaded is meaningless. Many people suspect Margarito knew, but no one can prove it, and this is the crux of the matter: conjecture, suspicion, intuition, whispering campaigns—none of this is enough.
Pacquiao has stated his position clearly: he believes Margarito cheated knowingly but that Margarito deserves a second chance. Some folks throw the word “ethics” around as if they were boyhood chums of Kant or Hume and the altruism they expect of a professional prizefighter is silly. Pacquiao should be allowed to make his own judgments and not have to be harangued, from crumbling cyber-soapboxes, over his opinions and be insulted by folks who always seem to have the words “moral,” “ethical,” and “right” dangling from the ends of their magic fingertips. That must be some kind of special feeling.
Nor does Freddie Roach having called for a ban on Margarito some time ago function as a smoking gun. All this proves is that Roach is sentient enough to understand that his personal opinion does not slow down the rotation of the earth, eclipse sun and moon, or reverse continental drift. If only more people thought that way.
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Among the wayward moral standards crew is Kevin Iole, who days after going on an extended jag about principles and ethics, hinted that Mikkel Kessler is feigning his eye injuries to get out of the Super Six Tournament. How did Janus Iole come to this strange conclusion in the first place? Like most self-absorbed people who think that their opinions move heaven and earth, he got it from watching TV. “I became even more suspicious of Kessler’s injury,” Iole wrote, “after seeing Showtime’s Fight Camp 360 on Wednesday, in which Kessler was driving his car and talking to the camera after he had withdrawn from the tournament. If he has double vision, is it a good idea to be driving a car at all, let alone while keeping only partial attention on the road? I think not.” Maybe getting punched in the face exacerbates his condition in a way that driving a car does not?
At this point, Iole sticks out as a giant sore thumb of phoniness. Smearing a fighter without any proof is a violation of his own pretend ethics, no doubt, but, like a man suffering from erectile dysfunction, it seems like Mr. Iole can keep it up (his moral hard-on) for only so long.
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See Also:
The Weepy Kind: Antonio Margarito & The Media
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Tags: Antonio Margarito, Freddie Roach, Kevin Iole, Manny Pacquiao, Moral Hard-ons, Tim Starks, Top Rank
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Is it really fair to argue that because something has occurred in the past, and even continues to occur at present, that any criticism hereof as it relates to Margarito-Pacquiao is null, or somehow hypocritical?
You of all bloggers, in your infinite cynicism (of which I'm a fan), should know that the dysfunction and ass-backwards practices that plague boxing are lined up six deep, and are far too dense for any critically-minded fan to consistently traverse without losing faith in the sport altogether. In other words, taking the all-too-apparent bad with the rare but oh-so-worth-it good is just an occupational hazard of being a boxing fan.
You can't seriously expect fans to pipe up with indignation every time another empty alphabet title is handed out. My God. When would we eat? When would we sleep? You'd have to assign shift work just to keep up with the alphabet lunacy.
I don't think it's a secret that most fans are frustrated with the proliferation of meaningless belts, nor is it news that a lot of fans don't look favourably on catch-weight bouts. And that displeasure is certainly not restricted to Margarito vs. Pacquiao.
But what the case of Margarito-Pacquiao does provide is a worth-while platform from which to voice these complaints.
It's one thing when two faceless Junior Flyweights are matched up at a catch-weight to contest the vacant interim special collector's edition IBO strap. It's obviously farcical, but no more farcical than most daily occurrences in the world of governing bodies and negotiations. But when such arbitrary nonsense begins to take its toll at the sport's highest level, and more importantly on a stage fit to make an imprint on the history of the fight game, then it becomes an issue worth complaining about.
I'll give you an example. For a long time, I was never particularly bothered by Floyd Mayweather's hesitance to take on the best his division had to offer. It was certainly frustrating to watch a once-in-a-generation talent piss away his prime years, but Floyd had made it clear that his priority was in the money-making business not the legacy-building one. At least he was honest. That changed when he began to compare himself to Sugar Ray Robinson, talking about how unlike Robinson he had never lost a fight, and thus was entitled to some slice of the all-time crown. At this point, Floyd was trying to have his cake and eat it, too. Boxing has a history it can be proud of -- it's one of the few remaining remnants of dignity this sport has. If a fighter wants to be a part of that history, then it's my right as a fan to stand up and call bullshit on what I deem to be a weak case; it's my right to demand more from that fighter. If, on the other hand, that fighter is content to make his money without a thought in the world to his legacy, that simply refusing to pay for his fights is protest enough.
I see Manny Pacquiao in the same vein. Manny is walking in rarified air right now. Like Floyd, Manny is on the verge of possibly top-20 all-time status. Unlike Floyd, it's his resume that puts him in the discussion. Either way, the result is the same. As the stakes and the historical ramifications rise, so too does the fans' right to call bullshit on things that otherwise may have been shrugged off as reality of modern-day boxing.
Basically, my issue with Margarito being granted this bout rests not so much on the absolute justice or injustice of his being allowed to fight and earn a pay check (although I absolutely have an issue with it) as it does on the implications for Manny Pacquiao and his bid for (excuse the histrionics) boxing immortality.
A fighter's prime lasts only so many years, providing a tiny window in which to make one's mark on the sport. Fighters today step into the ring so infrequently that every contest has the ability to make an disproportionally large mark on a boxer's legacy. This is not true in other sports, where an off-day at the plate, or a cold night from the free-throw line, is quickly swallowed up by the massive number of games played in a given season. So it's important for any fighter to choose his opponents wisely, but it's doubly important for someone like Manny, whose interest goes beyond financial gain and entertainment provided to his fans. He's a once-in-a-generation fighter in the prime of his career on the verge of greatness. He has what – two, three fights left before retirement? It may be a while until we see someone like him again. I think it's in the fans interests to make sure the opponents for those final bouts are chosen wisely, as to maximize entertainment value and, most importantly, legacy.
It's for this reason, I think, that I and many other fans have chosen to voice their displeasure over things like catch-weights and undeserving opponents, where in other situations we might have ignored it.
You mentioned in a previous post that while we may not like many of the decisions made by promoters, including the one to grant Margarito the Pacquiao fight, we can not in certain examples doubt their financial wisdom. I agree, but I'll add that this is no reason to hold off on voicing our displeasure. It's not our job to make sure Top Rank or Golden Boy is in the black at the end of the financial year. Both these and other companies pay good money to well trained people to see these goals through. We know full well that financial considerations in boxing will often run head on with considerations of entertainment and fighter legacy. But for the good of the sport, there needs to be a voice that promotes these things, chipping away at the promoters' conventional wisdom. It may be ridiculous from a financial perspective for Top Rank to throw Manny Pacquiao in with Paul Williams, but that shouldn't stop us from calling for it. If it's true that the financial health of certain promotions is in conflict with the competitive health of the sport, someone needs to be there to trumpet the cause of the latter. I rue the day that talented and obviously passionate writers like yourself just give up pushing for better, more competitive fights, simply because it's not in the promoters' financial interests.
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