By Chris Williams: Kevin Iole, Yahoo writer, reports on his Twitter page that Antonio Margarito’s trainer Robert Garcia says that Margarito and Brandon Rios didn’t know that Manny Pacquiao’s trainer Freddie Roach has Parkinson’s disease. Rios and Margarito were seen making fun of Roach recently in a video at Fanhouse, with both of them seemingly mocking Roach’s condition. Roach got pissed about it and has been complaining bitterly about it, seeing it as a low blow.

But with Garcia saying that Rios and Margarito didn’t know that Roach actually had a disease, that kind of takes the air out of the argument that Rios and Margarito were specifically targeting Roach for ridicule due to knowing he had a disease. Obviously, they were teasing Roach the way way he moves, but they may not have had a clue about why until now. I believe Garcia in him saying they didn’t know, because unless you follow Roach closely, it’s not something that’s mentioned a lot. I’ve giving Margarito and Rios the benifit of the doubt. These guys have never done things like this in the past and seem like to classy guys.

As far as this affecting the perceptions that boxing fans have about Margarito, I don’t see it having any affect on Saturday’s fight. Only diehard boxing fans will know about it and that won’t change people’s mind about whether they want to pay for the fight or not. Either they’ve decided to buy the fight or not by this point. The casual boxing fans won’t have clue one about this incident and likely won’t care because they won’t know who Roach is or care. Casual boxing fans only care about the fighters, and not trainers that like to talk a lot like Roach does. He’s not the news, Margarito and Pacquiao are. This is their show unless they want to stage a fight between Garcia and Roach after the Pacquiao-Margarito fight. In that case, I’m betting on Garcia by knockout.