Roach mocks Margarito with hand wraps

MANILA, Philippines - Freddie Roach should carry a metal detector when he visits Antonio Margarito’s dressing room on fight night.

Margarito’s trainer, Robert Garcia, kept the mind game going when he put on brass knuckles during their recent media workout at the Fortune Gym in Hollywood.

“That’s [metal] what he [Richardson] found. Do you believe that? He [Margarito] got caught,” Garcia said in an article that came out of Fanhouse.com the other day.

It was Shane Mosley’s trainer, Naziim Richardson, who discovered the plaster-like substance in Margarito’s hand wraps before their fight in January of 2009.

It led to the one-year suspension of Margarito, who claimed he had no knowledge of what his former trainer, Javier Capetillo, had placed on his hands for the fight, which he lost by knockout.

“That’s what fell out when Naazim Richardson saw it,” Garcia said at the gym packed with mediamen.

“Manny, be careful,” he added. “Freddie Roach, you had better be in the dressing room like you said. You had better be there all of the time. Watch out, Freddie Roach.”

Margarito hit the mitts for a couple of rounds before the media, and his punches sounded heavy on video.

Roach had said he will personally be there when Margarito’s hands are wrapped, and make sure they’re clean.

“Yes, I will be there,” said Roach.

A day before Margarito staged his media workout, Pacquiao had his own time with the media a few blocks away at the Wild Card Gym.

And before the session started, Roach brought the house down when he wore a pair of armored gloves in mocking Margarito.

“I am going to make sure that Antonio Margarito wears hand wraps, not gift wraps, when he faces Manny Pacquiao,” Roach was quoted as saying.