Roach concerned with Pacquiao’s huge entourage

By Boxing News - 11/20/2014 - Comments

roach777By Jim Dower: Trainer Freddie Roach was concerned with his fighter Manny Pacquiao’s huge entourage that boarded the plan this week to fly over to Macau, China to watch him fight Chris Algieri at the Venetian Macao’s Cotai Arena.

Roach feels that many of the members of Pacquiao’s entourage are guys that he doesn’t know by name. Roach thinks that this large group of people could ultimately be a distraction for Pacquiao as he tries to relax and get ready for his tough title defense against Algieri.

Roach says he spoke to Pacquiao about his views about the entourage. The large group of people took two planes, and there were 380 people on those planes. Some of the people were part of Team Pacquiao. It’s unclear just how many of the members of the entourage are simply there to support him without having an official capacity.

“I’m not happy about that, not at all,” Roach said via Dan Rafael of ESPN.com. “Half the people on the planes, Manny doesn’t even know their names. But the worst thing is they came so early in the week. They will be all over Manny. If they came on the night of the fight, fine. I asked Manny about it. He knows I was not happy. I told him it’s a little [expletive] crazy.”

If Roach were able to play a bigger part in filtering out the distractions from the many members of Pacquiao’s large entourage, it would ultimately make things a little easier on him during the last days before his fights. Having a huge group of people following him around has got to be a stressor for Pacquiao.

It’s fine if he’s able to deal with the huge entourage that follows him around, but if it’s something that wears him down, then it might be better for Top Rank to be a little more assertive in keeping Pacquiao more insulated during the final days before his fights.

“He just smiled at me. He doesn’t care. But that’s a lot of people. Two planes,” Roach said.



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