Pacquiao: For better or for worse

CNN never really had the hots for boxing. As an international news network, it knows that the number of boxing fans pale in comparison to the huge followings generated by other sports, such as football, which is concededly the world’s most popular.

But belatedly, CNN has realized that audience size is sometimes not determined by a particular sport but by the genuine interest generated by a particular story, such as the saga of Philippine boxing hero Manny Pacquiao.

The story of Pacquiao is not just an ordinary rags-to-riches tale. It has evolved into something that now exhibits some manic properties. Pacmania has swept the world and even the venerable CNN cannot remain impervious to that fact if it has to stay in the viewership game.

So CNN dove into the lake and got happily wet. It featured Pacquiao extensively in its Talk Asia segment, with replays that ran over several days. Newscasters went beyond reading the news and plowed straight into adlibbing about the Filipino monster hit.

One female newscaster, after reading the report about the sensational Pacquiao knockout of British superstar Ricky Hatton, segued into the weather report by asking the weather presenter if he saw the bout.

The question was a complete surprise and would have zapped less professional announcers like a bolt of lightning in a clear blue sky, especially since it was quite obvious the weather presenter could not have seen the fight even if he wanted to.

But with admirable savvy, the weather presenter skirted the issue beautifully to spare himself personally, yet still plow into the subject of Pacquiao without entirely losing track of what he was there for in the first place, which was to talk weather.

The weather presenter, without skipping a beat, took up the question of the newscaster by saying, “You know, at the time of the Pacquiao-Hatton fight, a typhoon was lashing the Philippines.”

“And you know what,” the weather presenter went on, “I got a lot of text messages, presumably from Filipinos all over the world. And they were not asking about the weather. They were asking about how the fight was going on.”

The Philippines is a country that has seen its share of internal strifes. On numerous times in its recent past, political upheavals such as coup plots not only disrupted national life but also attracted serious international attention.

But you know how veteran Filipino journalists put a finger to the wind to determine the gravity of any given political situation? They look toward CNN, that’s how. They monitor how CNN is reporting the news.

 If CNN is still reporting the news from its major centers like Atlanta, London or Hong Kong, you can guardedly relax that the situation in the Philippines is still manageable, and Filipino journalists can stop nibbling on their fingers.

But when CNN starts sending its senior international correspondents to Manila, and you begin seeing people like Christiane Amanpour reporting live from the nation’s capital, you know the big story is really about to explode.

I am bringing this up to put into context just how big the Pacquiao story has become. When Pacquiao returned to the Philippines, guess where I got the story? From CNN, from Hong Kong-based international correspondent Andrew Stevens, reporting live from Manila.

Having said that, let me now come to my real point — which is that Pacquiao himself must understand how big he has become and how, given his size (and the power and influence that comes with it), it is now so easy for him to do good, or bad, for the country.