By Lem Satterfield
When former world champion Antonio Margarito appears before a five-member panel of the Nevada State Athletic Commission on Friday in Las Vegas, in an attempt to regain his license to box in the United States, a potential November fight with Manny Pacquiao is not the only opportunity at stake.
If Floyd Mayweather Jr. accepts the proposal to fight Manny Pacquiao on November 13, Top Rank CEO Bob Arum will explore the possibility of staging a rematch between Margarito and WBA junior middleweight champion Miguel Cotto in December.
Margarito's boxing license was revoked in California in February 2009 following an illegal hand-wrapping scandal. Prior to his fight with Shane Mosley on January 24, 2009, Mosley's trainer Naazim Richardson discovered a hard plaster-like substance on Margarito's hand-wraps. The wraps, including two inserts, were confiscated by an inspector for the California commission.
Margarito's suspension ended on February 11. He returned to the ring in May, in Mexico, to win a ten round unanimous decision over Roberto Garcia. Arum feels Margarito has done his time and deserves to box again in the United States.
"Antonio is well-represented, and he's going to present his case to the Nevada Commission, and hopefully, they will see it his way and give him a license," said Arum. "I think that he's been out for more than enough time."
Margarito has always claimed that he was unaware of what his former trainer, Javier Capetillo, had placed in his gloves. Capetillo was also suspended last February by the California commission.
"He's [Capetillo] the one that wrapped the hands. So he's the one who does the job," Margarito said. "All that I do is put my hands out there so that he can wrap them, and that's what I did."
A Cotto-Margarito rematch would satsify any doubts about their first encounter. Since the hand-wrap scandal, Margarito's brutal stoppage of Cotto in 2008 has come under question.
Nevada State Athletic Commission director Keith Kizer is confident there was no foul play on the night Margarito stopped Cotto.
"I know that he wasn't rigged during the Cotto fight because we had our inspectors check him out and everything, as did Cotto's people. He was fully checked out. One of our referees, Jay Nady, was back there, we had our inspectors back there. Cotto's guy was back there. They all checked him out and everything was fine," said Kizer.
"They felt the hand wraps and everything, and we have an inspector who I've seen check the hand wraps before, and he checks them out thoroughly. He watched the hand wraps that night. If you don't have experienced inspectors, you can probably slip something through."
Lem Satterfield is the boxing editor at AOL FanHouse and the news editor at BoxingScene.com. To read more from Lem Satterfield, go to AOL FanHouse by Clicking Here.
