Would monies flood Pangasinan?

By Mortz C. Ortigoza

A father of a news caster of a regional TV station told me that his daughter was lucky because a national government department hired her.

“Nadinig niya kasi after election mag sasarado na ang TV station”.

This TV station used to sack last year many of its workers.

Many of them, in other parts of the country, even sued the owner for the illegal dismissal.

A former newscaster  told me the new owner in Manila wanted to close the station because what it reports on its evening news were redundant  with its morning news program.

“Saka ang revenues na kinikita niya hindi kaya i-pasuweldo with its staff and reporters”

I pity those present employees there. They should have been frantically looking now for work as election is only a month to go.

“Siga na si rival station dito as its maintain a regional morning and evening news,” I quipped

***

Political leaders of three neighboring Pangasinan towns have just been beneficiaries of tens of thousands of pesos from big time aspirants.

Because of it, leaders and voters in Dagupan City should cry their hearts out.

(Note: To the still uninitiated, the congressional, mayoralty, and vice mayoralty candidates in the City have no opponents in the May 9 election)

A mayor of one of these towns told me that these politicos chipped- in P9,000  so they can give it to each of the barangay chairmen while they shelled out P2000 for each of the village councilmen.

“Pinatawag ako ni Rival X at tinanung ako magkano ang bigayan sa lahat ng kapitan na pinapunta ko sa caucus with the opponent. Sinabi ko ang sinabi ng mga kapitan ko kung magkano ang bigayan,” he told me.

Rival X told him that he sets the meeting of the Kapitans and Council Members of the three towns in his building.

He said Rival X gave P10 thousand to each of the village chiefs and P3,000 to each of the sea of council members.

“Anak ng bakang dalaga, naglalagari ang mga kapitan, naka P19 thousand kaagad sila in the last two weeks,” I quipped.

He told me that a week before the election money would flood Pangasinan as his patron would triple the one given by the opponent.

“The plan is to give P500 to each voter. But if the opponent gives P500, Rival X will give P1,500”.

Was it a wishful brag? I posed to a political spectator who had an interest with Pangasinan politics.

***

After raking the hard earned seed monies (we Flips, er, Filipinos called it “capital”) of those Igorot vegetable and Pangasinan bangus or milkfish  wholesale traders when I bet for Floyd Mayweather the tuition fees of my children against their wagers for Manny Pacquiao, I should be turning 180- degree and predicts Pacquiao, the pet peeve of senatorial candidate Walden Bello, to pounce and trounce out American Tim Bradley in their rubber match this Sunday (Saturday in the U.S) until I saw the absence of a random drug testing for the duo.

“This sonnafabich (Pacquiao) would become a whirling dervish without the drug testing on this fight,” I told my errand boy Procopio Matulis after I Google if the duo subjected them anew to The World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) just like what they agreed on their 2014 

rematch.

Then last night as I prepared myself to bed, I saw at You Tube the training of Bradley and his new trainer, the verbal showboat former trainer - turned boxing commentator Teddy Atlas that changed my prognosis that this fight could either go to Manny or Timothy.

New Trainer’s Innovation to Bradley

As you know folks, in the first 2012 controversial fight of the aging Filipino Superman but Senatorial Shoo-in (God Save Us!) versus Bradley, he should had won it because of his hand speed, and in the 2014 rematch, he nearly lose against the bobbling and weaving attack styles of the American in the first six rounds until Bradley had calf injury.

It happened after Tim outbalanced himself due to his propensity to throw a looping right power punches to Manny.

That injury snapped out from him his foot work that used to elude Pacquiao in hitting him.

In the fourth round of that clash, he even hit Pacqauio’s left face with a powerful right uppercut that lifted by a foot, son of a gun, the feet of Manny from the canvass.

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But with Atlas innovation that was tested on Bradley knocking out the flabby and lethargic Brandon Rios (who struggled to reduce weight for the 147 pound’s Welterweight fight) at the ninth round in their November 2015 match (pssst Pacquaio only chalked up a unanimous decision on the Walking Punching Bag Rios in November 2013 at Macau, China and could not Knock him out (KO) ), and with Pacquiao fighting this time without folks from WADA, Voluntary Anti-Doping Association (VADA), and the United States Anti-Doping Agency (USADA) just like in his Mayweather’s match, knocking on his house’s door to take a sample of his blood they call in the jargon "drug and hormone testing that will undergo isotope-ratio mass spectrometry to detect exogenous testosterone from outside the body”.

Bradley, as what we Pinoys call “may tama si Bradley dito!”.

Effect of the absence of Random Drug Testing

Can you still remember Juan Manuel Marquez knocking out cold on the floor Manny Pacquiao at the Six Round of their Fourth Fight?

That match had no random drug test by the alphabet soup I mentioned. They just subjected themselves for the standard urine testing done by the doctors at the Nevada State Athletic Commission (NSAC).

Because of that medical liberality of NSAC, strength and conditioning expert Mexican Angel "Memo" Heredia, a former FBI Anti Doping witness, outsmarted conditioning coach Alex Ariza by making Marquez bulked into an Incredible Hulk where his heavy punches jarred Manny  until he brought the reckless Filipino into an ambushed by hitting him at the chin by a straight power punch at the seventh round that caused his KO.

My  friend and beer mate the late boxing writer Hermie Rivera , whose writing style and semantics could turned HBO In - House scribe the late Bert Sugar green with envy, shouted after Pacquiao-Marquez rubbermatch in 2011 “I couldn’t believe Heredia was allowed to train Marquez. And I also couldn’t believe how big and how strong Marquez was on the day of the fight. Manny felt his punches right from the start and probably knew he was up against a souped-up fighter. Manny could’ve been badly hurt. My idea is to clamp down on steroid pushers and users. There’s no place for those guys in boxing. We want to eradicate the use of performance-enhancing drugs which may be almost undetectable today.”

Fight could go either to Pacquiao or Bradley

Without random drug testing especially on the part of Manny Pacquiao and with a new innovation dealt by Atlas to Bradley to outpoint the Filipino, whose last knocked out of his opponent was in Miguel Cotto in 2010, I could say this match could either go the other way around.

It could be the Pacquiao’s Way, the Bradley’s Way, the Super Highway (psst “Draw”), or what Pangasinan Abono Party List's Congressman Conrad Estrella shouted to the sea of the hoi polloi at the Bong Bong Marcos for vice president rally “The Marcos Highway!”

Here’s what I suggest Pacquiao and Bradley should do to win.

PACQUIAO:

- Pacquiao gives emphasis on the upper cut every time they both mixed in a flurry of punches. Bradley loves to weave and bob.

- Unlike Floyd Mayweather who fought effectively Pacquiao with a long left jab to avoid being hit, the Filipino can time with a power punch Bradley who loves to stand in front of him.

- Counter the counter punch of Bradley, just like what Manny had done to Mayweather.

- Manny avoid Bradley looping counter punching right hand. He was using this technique all night at the rematch

 BRADLEY:

- Bradley should use frequently his left straight punch or left hook. Pacquiao has the tendency to leave open his right early period peasant- liked- face. “Hit it hard, baby!”

Emulate Mayweather accurate punching style where the American used his long left jabs in the distance and counter with his right punch every time the Filipino instinctively lunged with his right jabs followed by his face, just like before Marquez knocked him out, before he unleashed his right power punch.

- Don’t just throw the looping power right punch recklessly just like in the rematch in 2014 or in his other fights as he was just wasting his energy for them.

- Improve the weaving and bobbing as Manny hand speeds are still very fast. 

(You can read my selected columns at http://mortzortigoza.blogspot.com and articles at Pangasinan News Aro. You can send comments too at totomortz@yahoo.com)