MAN-ny of the Year

I fulfill my dad Frank’s dream today by writing about sports. A consummate athlete (he excelled in basketball, bowling, baseball and swimming), he was blessed by God with four daughters who couldn’t handle either a ball or a racquet. I don’t think he was sorry he had us, but I know he hoped many times in his life that at least one of us would do well in a sport, and not just in jackstones.

Anyway, floored as I was by the stunning victory of Manny Pacquiao over the favored Oscar De la Hoya Saturday night in Las Vegas, I turned sports enthusiast overnight. Well, maybe just for a day, but enough for me to watch the fight round by round till the fat lady sung.

When my husband Ed, surfing the Net around noon last Sunday, gave a gasp that I could hear from across the room, I knew something unexpected had just taken place. “Who won?” I asked Ed, just to make sure.

“Do you really want to know?” he asked and when I nodded he smiled just like he did on the third day of EDSA 1986. “Pacquiao!”

The day before, just about everybody I talked to gave Manny the chance of a snowflake in hell. Some feared not just for Manny’s health but also for his life and attributed his decision to take on the Golden Boy to greed and hubris. Interviewed on television, Manny simply said, “I believe in positive thinking.”

And Saturday night the snowflake did survive hell.

* * *

I watched a delayed telecast of the fight (it is easier on the stomach, though less exciting) and when Manny bounded out of his dressing room, looking relaxed and smiling like a little boy about to play in the yard, I knew that this was a fighter ready to take on the world with confidence.

De la Hoya, on the other hand, looked like he was on his way to a courtroom for sentencing, and had just been to the toilet after a nervous stomach. He looked so uptight he could snap anytime. Was it the weight loss? Was he dehydrated? Did he just have a bad night? Nevertheless, the crowd at the MGM Grand’s Garden Arena cheered him on like he were Maximus entering the Colloseum (Russel Crowe was in the audience, by the way).

And while Manny was smiling from ear to ear, De la Hoya was flexing his jaw muscles, looking like a cobra getting ready to swallow a horse.

Tears sprung unbidden to my eyes as the Philippine national anthem was sung by Karylle (who sometimes couldn’t hit the high notes, but no matter). It was a perfect moment, too, to see a Philippine Airlines 747 flying high onscreen, as if it were carrying our hopes for Manny with it to the sky.

And typical of the Filipino athlete, whether a basketball or boxing star, Manny began his fight by getting down on his knees in fervent prayer. It was humbling to see a champ work his butt off in training and still realize he needed much more than that to win. (Cory Aquino often said while she was president, “I work with all my might, pray with all my heart, and leave the rest to God.”)

* * *

You probably saw the fight, so I won’t go into the sometimes boring details.

There were times that De la Hoya just stood there, as if “mesmerized” by Manny. A sports commentator said he actually thought the Mexican-American was “bewitched, bothered and bewildered” by it all.

Some have actually ventured the opinion that the fight was fixed — why did De la Hoya seem to give victory away on silver platter? After all, didn’t De la Hoya have more to gain with a Pacquiao victory, business-wise? I am ashamed to admit that the thought also crossed my mind.

But what makes me think otherwise is that defining moment when De la Hoya sat glassy-eyed and spent on his stool, in one corner of the ring. As the officials were explaining to him his options and their consequences, he just sat there, stoic, as if stoned. Someone had to speak to him in Spanish, even if De la Hoya speaks better English than Pacquiao, who didn’t even need an interpreter. De la Hoya’s an LA boy, for crying out loud. But Spanish is probably his first language and when dazed and on the verge of being knocked unconscious, it is probably the language he understands.

That’s what makes me think he fought to near death. Hard to fake that.

* * *

My dad and mom invited some American and Mexican friends and some relatives to their apartment in Anaheim to watch the fight. Dad bet $195 on Pacquiao. Even one of Dad’s Mexican friends bet $150 on Pacquiao, as did my nephew Ram, who bet $5. In the spirit of friendship, they feasted on pancit and pollo loco after the fight.

After all, Pacquiao was magnanimous in victory, and De la Hoya was gracious in defeat.

“He was the better man,” the Mexican said of the Pinoy. “He deserves all the accolades.”

From Manny, there is much to be learned. Every small, frail boy now knows he can work his way into vanquishing the Goliaths in his midst. And in the end, practice really makes perfect.

And from the Golden Boy, there are golden lessons as well. He showed that defeat can be cushioned by dignity, and that hopelessness is not the twin of loss. Don’t despair.

Asked how he felt after the fight, De la Hoya, his face bruised and battered, answered: “If it’s not your night and a true champion defeats you... there is still another day tomorrow.”

I will drink a margarita to that.

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