By now, Antonio Margarito knows the questions like he knows an old sparring partner. He has heard them from the California State Athletic Commission. They have been thrown at him from all angles in the court of public opinion. He has heard them in whispers, shouts and legalese.
If his appearance Friday in front of the Nevada State Athletic Commission were a fight, Margarito should be ready. If he isn’t, he never will be in an attempt to regain a license in the United States about 18 months after his gloves were found to be loaded and potentially lethal before a loss to Shane Mosley in January, 2009.
His fate rests not so much in what he says, but in how he says it. It’s a subtle adjustment, more about tone than substance. So far, however, Margarito has either been unable or unwilling to assume some accountability for inserts in hand wraps applied by his former trainer, Javier Capetillo.
Since he began to talk to fans and the media a few months ago, Margarito has repeatedly, almost defiantly, said he had no idea what was in those wraps. He has always assigned the blame to Capetillo. The wraps belonged to Capetillo, Margarito said. But the hands have always belonged to Margarito, which is another way of saying he can never completely separate himself from what happened.
Here’s what he can do: He can continue to say he never knew what was in the wraps, but he can include an addendum, an apology for not knowing. For those adamantly opposed to Margarito ever fighting in the U.S. again, that won’t be enough. That opposition will always be there.
But a willingness to acknowledge his own accountability represents an important step that could win over skeptics, who have yet to hear any remorse in Margarito’s explanations.
There are plenty of other hurdles for the former welterweight champion, who has been free to apply for a license in any state since Feb. 11. There is protocol. California has yet to rule on an appeal of his license revocation at a hearing a few weeks after the altered wraps were discovered at Los Angeles Staples Center.
When there were Top Rank plans for Margarito to seek a license in Texas for a bout in March on the Manny Pacquiao-Joshua Clottey card in Dallas, the U.S. Association of Boxing Commissions urged that the revocation continue. Top Rank never pursued the license. Instead, Margarito fought in Mexico, winning on May 8 in his only bout since the California revocation.
Margarito is back, this time in Nevada, because he looms as a possibility for Pacquiao on Nov. 13 if Floyd Mayweather, Jr., says no next week. If Pacquiao-Mayweather is a go, then a Margarito rematch with Miguel Cotto, perhaps in December, is on Top Rank’s agenda.
There has long been speculation that Margarito’s hand wraps were altered in similar fashion for his stunning, brutal upset of the previously unbeaten Cotto in Las Vegas during the summer of 2008. There is lingering confusion about Margarito’s beat-down of Cotto at the MGM Grand.
Speculation about Margarito’s hand wraps on that night has been fueled in part by a Cotto comment. In a conference call, Cotto said nobody from his corner was in Margarito’s dressing room to watch how Capetillo wrapped his hands. However, Cotto’s assertion has been disputed in various news reports by officials and inspectors assigned by the Nevada Commission. Margarito’s management team also has told 15 rounds that somebody from Cotto’s corner was in fact in Margarito’s dressing room.
Still, suspicion about what was in Margarito’s hands for Cotto will never vanish. If Margarito didn’t know before Mosley, he can’t say he knew before, during or after Cotto.
But he can say he should have known.
That decision has always been in his hands.
NOTES, QUOTES
· Robert Guerrero said his wife’s cancer is in remission. Casey has been battling leukemia. “My wife is doing great,’’ Guerrero said Thursday in a conference call that included Joel Casamayor, his opponent for a junior-welterweight bout July 31 on the Juan Manuel Marquez-Juan Diaz II card at Las Vegas Mandalay Bay. “She’s doing so great. That’s why I’m taking big fights and getting back into the ring.”
· Casamayor is 38 and confident as ever. “Losing is not an option,’’ Casamayor, the former lightweight champion, said. “Retirement is not an option.’’ Casamayor said he wants a rematch with Marquez, who stopped him in the 11th round in 2008.
Photo by Chris Farina/Top Rank
