Suit against Manny Pacquiao: Any merit?

Two Las Vegas boxing fans have filed a class-action suit seeking $5 million in damages from boxer Manny Pacquiao, his manager and promoters on claims that Pacquiao fraudulently hid a shoulder injury from fans before his Fight of the Century matchup with Floyd Mayweather Jr.

That Pacquiao’s team announced this week that the boxer will undergo surgery on the shoulder, injured during training, would seem to buttress their case, as would the comments from the powerful Nevada Athletic Commission that it is considering taking action against the boxer for not disclosing the injury before the fight.

Is there any merit to the suit, and whatever action the athletic commission may take?

In a word, no. In a few more words, the suit is obviously without merit, as is any idea that the Nevada Athletic Commission is going to do anything other than issue another hand-wringing press release or two. The fees it collected frpm the megafight will keep that office funded for the next decade, and in that context, what the people at the commission should be doing is getting down on their hands and knees and thanking Pacquiao for going through with the fight, as opposed to threatening him with a suspension

Pacquiao just did what athletes are supposed to do, in two respects. He played hurt, which is what athletes for time immemorial have been asked to do. He also played a little Bill Belichick in not giving Mayweather’s camp any advance warning on the fact that he was going to be fighting with essentially one and a half hands.

It was clear that Pacquiao was going to fight, noble how that notion might be or not, and the motivation was likely anything but noble. It took six years to get the Fight of the Century to come to fruition, so you have to suppose that delaying it 9-12 months for Pacquiao to go through surgery and rehab would effectively kill it once and for good.

This is where the idea that not disclosing the injury was fraudulent. It’s hard to go back and be honest about how news that Pacquiao was battling a sore shoulder would have played in the run-up to the big fight. No doubt the Pacquiao team would have spun the hell out of it to make it seem as minor as possible, the indication to that being that the fighter and his cronies sold themselves on the idea that he could still be competitive even in his diminished state.

It’s hard to imagine enough evidence being presented in court to convince a jury that Pacquiao was aiming to defraud the boxing public of their money by failing to tell the world that he was something of damaged goods. He was competitive through the early rounds, and went the entire 12 rounds with Mayweather, who in winning convincingly on the judges’ scorecards never did land anything resembling a hard shot on Pacquiao, who for his part did land a couple of impressive flurries in the early rounds that had the live crowd buzzing.

Which is to say, Pacquiao didn’t go through the motions of fighting, then take a dive so that he could collect the big paycheck.

He was hurt going in, fought his ass off anyway, had a puncher’s chance to pull off the upset, came up short after going the distance.

Those who feel like victims of fraud aren’t that far off, in a sense. A Fight of the Century it was not, but that wasn’t because Pacquiao was fighting with a bum shoulder.

Mayweather followed the fight plan that he has been using for the past decade in rolling to the decision: land a few pitty-pat shots to score points on CompuBox, use his masterful defensive skills to avoid getting hit, win a boring decision.

A healthy Pacquiao may have been able to take Mayweather off his game. Emphasis on may have. It’s highly doubtful.

You want to sue anybody, sue the promoters for touting this fight as the Fight of the Century, because the fight that we got was the fight that we should have known we were going to get.

– Column by Chris Graham