With the distinction of being history’s first eight-division world champion and currently possessing an extended stock spanning politics, entertainment and evangelism aside from sports, boxing legend Emmanuel Pacquiao should seriously consider stepping into the athlete’s pantheon of mentors.
As a pugilist par excellence, Pacquiao many moons ago stepped onto a stage with nothing left to prove.
The Pacman’s loss on Saturday to Juan Miguel Marquez was a watershed moment for the Mexican but was forgivable if not forgettable for Pacquiao’s legions of fans.
It would be hard to see the Pacman to allow himself to be dictated upon by the vain workings of ring fame and economics, only for him to end up a pulp.
Retirement from boxing would not be equivalent to surrender, but a pause for prudence that is sometimes the better part of valor.
By modest standards, Pacquiao, nearing 34, has already won more in prize money than he can live on in a lifetime.
He can always run a boxing clinic to train future champions and spend his energies improving sports in the Philippines.
Besides, of what use would the Pacman be if he runs himself down by boxing to the point of disability that he is no longer able to do what his Saranggani constituents sent him to Congress to do?
What projects would befit him, reduced to a pulp, in the world of show? How will he, made a relic before his last breath, minister to the faithful who have come under his spiritual leadership?
Brain surgeons say that magnetic resonance imaging scans have shown that more than 80 percent of all professional boxers have serious brain scars.
We have only to look at the effects of excessive boxing on that other great pug, Muhammad Ali, shivering in the shadow of Parkinson’s disease.
Add to the list of injured Z Gorres or the late flyweight Karlo Maquinto, 21, to see that it is time for Pacquiao to realize that it’s time to move on.