FROM LAS VEGAS — On a stunning Saturday night in Las Vegas, you could almost hear the 90 million people on those Pacific Islands thousands of miles to the West, screaming in delight.
Their guy, Manny Pacquiao, the pride of the Philippines, had just beaten Oscar De La Hoya.
Not just beaten him, destroyed him. Humiliated him. Sent him into retirement. Pacquiao's victory had ended an era in boxing that spanned more than 10 years and was the personal domain of a great boxer known as the Golden Boy.
No mas.
After eight rounds of taking a barrage of punches from the stocky, supposedly undersized Pacquiao, De La Hoya walked across the ring to Pacquiao. But not to box. To congratulate Pacquiao on being the better man, the better fighter, the new No. 1 kid on the block.
De La Hoya then told Pacquiao's trainer, Freddie Roach, who had predicted all this, "You were right, Freddie. I don't have it anymore."
Seldom has a retirement been announced so dramatically, nor correctly, although De La Hoya may fudge for a week or so.
It went down officially as an eighth-round technical knockout. Roach, who had trained De La Hoya a year and a half ago in his split-decision loss to Floyd Mayweather Jr. in this same MGM Grand ring, had predicted Pacquiao would take out De La Hoya in the ninth round.
"The only surprise in this one," Pacquiao said, "was that my trainer picked the round."
Roach had called a lot more than this. Among other things, he had said that De La Hoya could no longer "pull the trigger." In this one, the Golden Boy seldom even got the gun cocked.
De La Hoya was favored by most boxing experts based on the fact that his body frame was an estimated 20% bigger than Pacquiao's. Those experts apparently didn't factor in the size of Pacquiao's heart, nor the length of De La Hoya's tooth.
Pacquiao weighed in Friday at 142 pounds for the 147-pound fight, and De La Hoya, who has fought all the way up to 160, weighed 145. At fight time, Pacquiao weighed 148 1/2 , De La Hoya 147. The 29-year-old from the Philippines had become the little big man for this one.
Interestingly, De La Hoya himself had made a prediction that, unwittingly, turned out to be true.
"I am training in this one for King Kong," he said, always smiling.
Pacquiao said, "I knew right away in the first round that I had him," adding that once he was able to defend De La Hoya's vaunted jab, he knew there were no other weapons forthcoming.
