By Lem Satterfield
Freddie Roach, Manny Pacquiao's trainer, said he believed that Antonio Margarito's trainer, Robert Garcia, should have stopped the fight in the eighth or the ninth round. Pacquiao was landing countless hard shots on Saturday night at Cowboys Stadium in Arlington, Texas. By the twelfth round, both of Margarito's eyes were nearly swollen shut, his face was badly swollen and he sustained several bad cuts.
The punishment was enough to make Pacquiao pull back on his punches in the final two rounds. Roach believes the beating was so brutal that Margarito may never fight again.
"I thought for sure that he would quit, but he has a lot of balls. But I truly, truly think that your job as a trainer is to protect your fighter. His corner, they should have saved him. He'll probably never fight again. He took too many unnecessary punches and too much unnecessary punishment. That was too much punishment to me," said Roach.
Roach has witnessed Pacquiao dish out a lot of punishment over the years, but the fight with Margarito was the most brutal beating that he ever saw his Filipino champion execute. Roach doesn't understand why Garcia allowed the punishment to continue in those last couple of rounds.
"After eight rounds, it was over, and it was just a matter of time. This is the worst beating I've ever seen Manny give to a fighter, accumulation-wise, number of punches landed, I mean, he took a lot of shots," said Roach. "I know that he's a very resilient guy, and he's a tough guy who has no quit in him, but the corner man is supposed to protect his fighter, and sometimes, you have to make those decisions. I don't know why they didn't stop the fight."
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.
