Let us not make a mountain out of a molehill

I do not know why some people are making a big deal out of Filipino boxer Jimrex Jaca's first round knockout of Mexican Geronimo Hernandez in one of the opening bouts, as differentiated from "the undercard," of the epic Manny Pacquiao-Erik Morales battle in Las Vegas January 21.

And the more I do not understand the uproar over the alleged shabby treatment he got when he arrived in Manila with Pacquiao, specifically his being ignored by crowds during the motorcade and his having been shut out from a press conference intended for Pacquiao.

I do not wish to come on as arrogant or what, but I suspect the people making all these noises know only a little of boxing and just got caught up in the overall euphoria surrounding the sensational win of Pacquiao over Morales.

My suspicions are bolstered by the fact that these people refer to the Jaca-Hernandez bout as the undercard of the Pacquiao-Morales fight. To those who know boxing, the undercard of the night was the rematch between Venezuelan Alexander Munoz against Mexican Martin Castillo.

While technically an undercard is any bout other than the main match, the real undercard is what we call locally as the supporting main event. Other bouts prior to the supporting main event and the main event itself are either curtain raisers, preliminaries, special attractions. And the Jaca-Hernandez bout was definitely not the undercard as we know it. In fact, and I hate to say this since Jaca is Filipino, ug Bisaya pa gyud, the fight was so unregarded there were virtually no people around to see it, judging by what we saw on tv.

Another indication of this was that the noted ring announcer Michael Buffer was not even around to lend his booming voice to open the bout with his patented " Let's get ready to rumble " yell. Clearly, the Jaca-Hernandez bout was not part of what Buffer got paid for to introduce.

And why would it? Newspaper accounts said that as late as three days before the fight, promoters were still frantically looking for a boxer to pit against Jaca. His original opponent got indisposed, and so did the replacement. Hernandez was the third, picked at the last minute.

I do not wish to belittle Jaca. His record speaks highly of him and he shows a lot of promise. But let us put things in proper context. To those who know boxing, one look at Hernandez even before the opening bell and you know he is not going to last the round.

Compared to the youthful rippling muscles and the well-trimmed body of Jaca, Hernandez was a flabby, out-of-shape sorry excuse willing to earn a few quick bucks the hard way and in the process save the promotion from a potential lawsuit in case the fight was scrapped unannounced.

Filipinos may be hungry for heroes, but we are not about ready to be rendered stupid by that hunger that we would just tout any victory as a heroic and epic win simply because our boy happened to score a first round knockout on pay-per-view tv in America.

I apologize to Jaca, his family, handlers, friends, townmates and other supporters. But there is simply no way I can go along with the notion that his win was even anywhere near that of Pacquiao for him to deserve similar attention, much less adulation.

I do wish Jaca well and the best of luck. But the moment has simply not come for anyone to start demanding what the circumstances just cannot start giving him. As they say in Cebuano, which Jaca, being Bisaya, can understand --- ubayubay pa siya ug gikinahanglang kan-on.

And just in case the question may arise because of this position I am taking, I am not a little wet behind the ears in boxing. I have been a boxing nut since I was in short pants, when I used to tag along with my papa to what was then the mecca of local boxing, the Cebu Coliseum.

I saw two fights of the legendary Gabriel Flash Elorde there, one against the Indonesian Pontainorasing Isarasak, the other against compatriot Rene Barrientos. I could have seen a third, against the Japanese Teruo Kosaka, but my father did not take me because of the huge crowd.

I can still recall some crowd drawers then --- Francisco Balug, Tony Jumao-as, Bernabe Villacampo, Jesse Necessario, Arthur Fuego, Carl Penalosa, Ric Penalosa, Baby Paramount, Little Paramount, Vil Tumulak, Ely Yares, Joe Lepiten, Flor Escobido, Ben Aldeguer.

In the fantasy world of a boy in shorts, I used to dream of being a boxer. I even managed to coax an aunt to buy me two sets of gloves, and with them punched silly boys my size. But the entire neighborhood caught on, and because grown men cannot be boys again, they busted my gloves.

Other interests whipped me away from an actual career in boxing, and I thank God for that because I never developed the body for such an exacting sport. But my love for it would stay and that is why it pains me when people try to sound like experts when in fact they talk nonsense.