0		Manny Pacquiao, Richie Mepranum, Hernan ‘Tyson’ Marquez, flyweight, boxing

Promising Filipino boxing stylist Richie Mepranum of Sarangani weighed in at 112.25 pounds the day before he is scheduled to face Mexican Hernan ‘Tyson’ Marquez for a fringe World Boxing Council flyweight title in the state of Texas in the US.

His opponent however was told to shed off excess pounds, coming in at 113.5 lbs.  Marquez was given 30 minutes to trim down to the flyweight limit as of press time.

Mepranum, a protégé of Maasim mayor Jojo Lopez, quietly left the country in January to prepare for this fight (Saturday morning, Mearch 13, in the Philippines).

Like his ring idol Manny Pacquiao, Mepranum is headlining a boxing card in Texas – his first main billing in the US – just a day before Manny goes up against Ghanian Joshua Clottey.

Signed by Top Rank after his smashing debut in the undercard of the Oscar de la Hoya-Many Pacquiao super fight in December 2008, Saturday’s fight will be Richie’s third in the US.

A win over the tough Mexican could lead to a title shot within the year.

Mepranum last fought in November, also in the under card of Pacquiao-Cotto fight, where he eked out a close split decision win over Ernie Marquez.

Richie holds a respectable ring-record of 16 wins, one draw and two losses, according to boxing website www.boxrec.com.

But his manager Jojo Lopez said Richie only lost once – a hometown decision against world contender Denkaosan Kaovichit in Mepranum’s first fight overseas in 2007.

His other reported loss, against Panomroonglek Kratingdaenggym of Thailand, was disputed by Lopez.

“Richie never fought Kratingdaenggym.  Some unscrupulous manager used Richie’s name for another boxer,” Lopez revealed.

The matter was investigated by the Games and Amusement Board and Richie was cleared by the country’s governing body in boxing.

	2	1	Manny Pacquiao, Joshua Clottey

Ghanian Joshua Clottey heads to this weekend’s bout with Filipino ring sensation Manny Pacquiao a prohibitive underdog. Figuratively, he needs to change continents to have a Chinaman’s chance.

If Clottey was fighting a Manny Pacquiao circa 2005 at the same weight level, the odds would have been stacked heavily in his favor.

Trouble is, Manny has since morphed into a complete fighter and is no longer a left-handed happy bomber.  He has added a vicious right hook to his vastly improved arsenal and now throws punches at odder angles.  His under-rated short left uppercut thrown like an underhanded twisting left hook, one that put Miguel Angel Cotto to the canvas in the third round, is as dangerous as his piercing left straight.  Frankly, there is no punch in Manny’s arsenal that cannot put down even the heaviest of welterweights once it hits its target squarely.

In addition, Manny has developed his speed not just as an offensive weapon.  It has also become his primary defensive strategy.  After all, you cannot hurt what you cannot hit.

Erik Morales, the last man to hand Manny a loss, provided the blueprint on how to defeat the Filipino bomber.

Tall that he is, Morales fought tall by throwing stiff jabs, sometimes doubling them up, and unleashing uppercuts to a charging Pacquiao.

Morales also opted to fight from the outside where he exploited his reach advantage. He made a mistake of challenging Manny in a macho display of firepower in the last two rounds in the first of their three epic fights and it nearly cost Morales the bout.

Joshua Clottey must be aggressive with his jabs if he is to disrupt Manny’s frenetic speed and rhythm.  He should also throw right leads and move side to side.  If he stays with his ‘passive defense’, as Pacquiao coach Freddie Roach described it, he will be eaten alive.  Joshua’s defense might hold up in the first couple of rounds but Manny will eventually break down that wall with punishing right hooks to the body and left straights to the solar plexus.

Manny will make Joshua respect his punches by way of right hooks off the Ghanian’s jabs in the early going and move in with his vaunted lefts in the middle rounds.

Of course, Clottey must lure Manny in a close quarter, phone-booth war of attrition to be able to throw his short punches, his main strength, to have a chance at upending Manny’s incredible winning streak.

Otherwise, it could be a short evening or a long agonizing night for him.

	1	2	Pacquiao watch, Manny Pacquiao

Mention the names of Kobe Bryant, Tiger Woods and Manny Pacquiao in the same article.  What crosses your mind?

Super athletes?

Nike endorsers?

Millionaire sportsmen?

Certainly.

But this piece is not about how the three are on the top of their respective sports discipline. It is about the price they had to pay and the ‘trophies’ they buy for being sports celebrities.

Tiger Woods, the world’s number one golfer and maybe the best that golf has ever seen, recently emerged from hiatus after making himself disappear from the limelight on account of his well-documented extra-marital affairs.

Not too long ago, Kobe Bryant was subjected to public scorn after he was accused of raping a spa attendant in Denver, Colorado.

So where do these two controversies place our very own Manny Pacquiao?

Not too long ago, a woman who reportedly bore a son courtesy of Manny’s alleged many trysts came out in the open asking for support for her child.

Now, you are getting the drift of this piece. Right?

Athletes, by their physical make-up and training regimen are oozing with hormones, in the case of men, and estrogen for women.  These chemicals that our body produces also increase our libido and sexual drives.

We are like other members of the animal kingdom in that we attract members of the opposite sex, even of the same sex, once in heat.  What differentiates us from other animal species is that we can control our sexual urge while animals normally do not.

When you are at the apex of your popularity, men or women tend to gravitate towards you and that is when temptations and libidos feed to each other.

Why are Woods and Bryant held to public scorn while Manny, whose latest conquest is said to be the starlet daughter of an actor who often plays Jesus Christ in Lenten plays, spared from the same level of scrutiny?

Manny’s alleged ‘lotharic’ adventures, if true, will certainly make Tiger and Kobe look teenage prom boys.  But Manny has so far deflected public ire and ridicule the two other super athletes suffered when their respective trysting scandals broke out.  So far.

Why?

Because Manny keeps winning big.  Because Manny feeds on the Filipino people’s yearning for one moment of greatness which this country has failed to deliver. 

For now, the Filipino people are more than willing to turn blind eye even if Manny represents all but an embodiment of an ideal Filipino family man.  For as long as Manny provides for his wife and kids and his friends, he can have all the women he wants and nobody will care.

After all, this country even elected presidents in the past who are unabashed adulterers and certified Lotharios.

Asian societies have long history of polygamous relationships. 

Chinese feudal lords are known to maintain harems as the bigger their families are, the broader the extent of their dynasties and influence are.

Among Muslims in Asia, royalties and datus are allowed to marry up to four women and can divorce any of their wives.

Among Filipinos, at least the Roman Catholics and other Christian denomination, maintaining paramours is no longer going against the grain of their faith.  It has become a status symbol and Manny is no different.

No matter how Manny denies it, the truth is public perception may not be just about it.  It has become a matter of public knowledge.

That it is why even if Manny has committed the same sexual indiscretions as Tiger and Kobe did, he will not be pilloried as the others were because the Filipino psyche has been permissive when it comes to matters involving extra-marital affairs.  After all, the company that Manny keeps are themselves known womanizers.

	0	1	Philippines, NPA, rebel attack

New People’s Army rebels ambushed a platoon of soldiers patrolling in a remote village in the island of Mindoro just south of Luzon Saturday morning killing 11 soldiers and wounding seven others.

It was the worst government loss this year coming just three weeks before the communist-led rebel forces celebrate their 41^st founding anniversary.

Reports said the government troops were responding to reports of the presence of armed men in the village of Panaytayan town in Oriental Mindoro when they were ambushed by an undetermined number of NPA guerillas.

Lt. Col. Romeo Brawner Jr. of the Armed Forces Philippines’ public information office said soldiers led by 2nd Lt. Ronnie Sipsip engaged the rebels in a three-hour encounter but were placed in a disadvantaged position.

Government forces are conducting “clearing operations” in preparation for the May 10 elections to neutralize the NPAs who were reported to have been demanding fees from candidates to be able to campaign in “rebel-held territories.”

There were no immediate reports of casualties from the rebel side.

The NPA, the armed wing of the Communist Party of the Philippines (CPP), has been waging a Maoist-inspired guerilla war in the countryside. It was founded on March 29, 1969. The NPA claimed it has grown from a ragtag band to a nationwide “people’s army” operating in at least 120 guerilla fronts all over the Philippines.

Government security officials, however, said the number of NPA rebels had gone down to less than 5,000 armed regulars from a high of 25,000 during the peak of rebel activities in the mid-80s.

More than 40,000 have already been killed in more than four decades of guerilla activities in the country.

	1	1	Brownouts, Gensan, worsens

POWER supply in this port city has gone from bad to worse.

Beginning Friday, most of General Santos City was without power for twelve hours at three-hour intervals and running for three hours.

Sources from distribution cooperative Socoteco II said they have been advised by the National Grid Corporation of the Philippines (NGCP) that it was cutting off 50 megawatts of the cooperative’s 85-megawatt base load requirement.

Geronimo Desesto, institutional services head of Socoteco II said some feeder lines have been experiencing power outages of up to four hours.

“We are now looking at alternately shutting down our sub-stations instead of cutting off feeder lines,” he said.

The Socoteco II exec says they could not schedule the brownouts as warnings were “indicative.”

“NGCP will just call out to shed off so much load supply by the hour.  As much as we would like to schedule them, we cannot,” Desesto said.

Socoteco II has a peak load demand of 106 megawatts before the brownouts.

Its franchise area covers the city, all of Sarangani and the towns of Polomolok and Tupi in South Cotabato.

Power supply in Mindanao has worsened following prolonged dry spell during the last two months.

More than half (53%) of Mindanao’s power supply are generated by hydro electric plants but receding water levels at the Agus and Pulangi rivers have reduced available power supply to less than half of the hydropower plants’ actual capacities.  The two hydropower plants have a combined rated capacity of 982.1 megawatts but are reportedly now only producing less than 500 megawatts.

As a result, power supply deficit in the island reached 518 megawatts on Thursday last week.

But by Friday, Mindanao was already 700 megawatts short of the 1,451 MW peak demand.

NGCP officials earlier warned that power interruptions could last until June if the rain will come in May.

But government energy executives said that even if water levels in the Agus River complex and Pulangi River return to normal, Mindanao will still suffer from power interruptions as no new generating capacity will be available until at least 2012.

Mindanao has an existing generating capacity of 1,850.4 megawatts (MW) but the dependable capacity is only 1,520 MW.

Available capacity however has dropped to a little over 750 megawatts.

In a speech delivered during the 18th Mindanao Business Conference held in Koronadal City in September last year, Philippine Chamber of Commerce and Industry vice president for energy Jose Alejandro said Mindanao needs between 200 to 300 megawatts of additional power supply every three years to meet the growing demand and to avert a possible grinding halt to the island’s economy.

	2	3	Pacquiao watch, Manny Pacquiao, Joshua Clottey

Manny Pacquiao goes up a very prohibitive favorite against a tough customer in Ghana’s Joshua Clottey on March 13 (March 14, Philippine time) for the defense of his World Boxing Organization (WBO) welterweight crown.

The Filipino bomber is riding on an 11-fight winning streak – eight of them by knockouts en route to being proclaimed the best pound for pound fighter in boxing today.

The Clottey fight will only be Manny’s third in the welterweight class and the first un-handicapped fight in the division.

Manny is seeking to register another spectacular win following the aborted bout with Floyd Mayweather Jnr. before he plunges into the electoral campaign where he is seeking a seat in the Philippine Congress.

Clottey is coming off a close split decision loss to Miguel Angel Cotto whom Manny badly battered en route to a stunning stoppage with just 55 seconds into the 12^th round in November last year.

Clottey is one of the underrated welterweights who has never been stopped in his career and has been fighting at the welterweight limit and beyond since 1998, three years after Manny debuted as a 106-pound professional boxer. 

The Ghanian carries a decent punch and is very durable and these qualities make him a dangerous opponent against top-tiered welterweights.

Aside from Mayweather and Shane Mosley, Pacquiao could find no better opponent than Clottey.

Clottey, however, is a slow opponent by Manny’s standards and does not have the counterpunching style that will disrupt the rhythm of the Filipino boxing champ.  Clottey comes straight forward, inviting opponents to penetrate his hands-over-his-face-defense - a rather above average one – then waits for the man in front of him to commit to a brawl.  He is a slugger and loves to throw short punches from the inside.  He occasionally throws jabs that are crisp.

Manny’s trainer Freddie Roach says he saw flaws in Clottey’s fighting style and I agree with him.

Manny’s right crosses off Clottey’s jabs and right hooks to the body will bring down the Ghanian’s defense. 

But unless Clottey develops overnight long uppercuts and left hooks that could catch Manny while the Filipino is darting out, Clottey will find the champion a difficult target to hit.

Manny will also try to penetrate Clottey’s defense by throwing powerful lead left straights after faking his rights.

The key is for Manny to keep a frenetic pace using lateral movements and head fakes while digging into the body of the Ghanian.

Again, Manny should stay away from the ropes as Clottey has good hand speed.

I see a late stoppage when Manny shall have broken down Clottey’s defense and frustrated him with his lighting quick speed in the early going.