Apology to Manny Pacquaio key to promotional peace for Golden Boy, Top Rank

It's been said that no one despises war like battle-scarred veterans.

When it comes to in the ring fights and courtroom battles, Top Rank's Bob Arum has won, lost and maybe had a few draws along the way through 45 years at the highest level of promotion.

So maybe it's not surprising that I detected a battle-weary tone to Arum's voice when we spoke early Wednesday morning about what has to be branded a Top Rank legal victory. It was the morning after Daniel Weinstein forbidding archrival Golden Boy from promoting runaway bantamweight champion Nonito Doniare Jr. until he completes his contractual obligations to Arum's outfit.

As I detailed earlier, Arum did not gloat. In fact, he sounded conciliatory towards the exciting Fil Am fighter and said he would seek only to promote and not to punish him for his seemingly now thwarted defection.

Beyond Donaire's fate and future, Arum offered an idea for something which he said might go a long way to “eliminate the warfare” between his company and Oscar De La Hoya's Los Angeles based promotional company.

According to Arum, squaring matters with his cash cow Manny Pacquiao is the key to peace between the fight game's top two promoters.

“The defamation case goes on for Manny,” Arum said, noting the recent defeat by Pacquiao attorneys of defense motions to dismiss the Pinoy Idol's defamation litigation. “They will be scheduling the depositions soon and then the case will make its way in front of a jury.”

Pacquiao has sued Golden Boy and others for, he said, making false accusations that he uses illegal drugs to better his ring performances.

“Manny Pacquiao is a sensitive guy. Manny Pacquiao values his good reputation. It was Oscar and (Richard) Schaefer who started this crap. It was they who continued to defame Manny.
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“Manny Pacquiao wants nothing to do with Golden Boy and neither would I.”

That probably reads more like a war chant than a peace directive but then Arum surprised me.

“I don't see all this as a war, really, because if Golden Boy, Oscar and Schaefer want to avoid eventually paying substantial damages to Pacquiao, they can apologize to him. They can say publicly that there was no factual basis for saying that Manny takes drugs....

“That would do a lot to clear the air here. That would do a lot to eliminate the warfare.”

Shifting back to Donaire, some have suggested that Nonito's strong-willed wife Rachel pushed her husband to look for greener promotional pastures.

Arum would not comment or even speculate on that topic but he did tell me a Marvelous Marvin Hagler anecdote I was not aware of.

Back when Hagler was Arum's cash cow, Arum said archrival Don King made a play to lure the baldheaded, lefthanded middleweight champion away from the Top Rank tent.

“King went with the racial pitch and he went through Marvin's mother, Bertha,” Arum said. “Pat Petronelli told me about King doing that. We were in Worcester (Mass.) where Hagler fought Tony Sibson and we had to go through a blizzard to get to the venue. (Feb. 11, 1983, Hagler stopped the Brit in six rounds).

“Marvin had a quiet talk with his mother and he told her, 'If you do anything to interfere in my business, I am not going to support you.”

Hagler remained with Top Rank up to and including his last bout, an undeserved decision loss to the also great Sugar Ray Leonard.

Soon after, he retired to Italy and lives La Dolce Vita, quite content in Milano I believe.

Source: http://www.examiner.com/