I hope Manny Pacquiao’s entourage doesn’t look at all those Pacquiao KO Memes I posted, because I might be next on their hit list.
A photographer’s job is to take photos, even if it is the great Manny Pacquiao knocked out cold. Unfortunately for Getty’s photographer Al Bello Pacquaio’s crew didn’t get the memo.
According to Bello, Pacquiao adviser Michael Koncz and assistant trainer Buboy Fernandez were kicking and punching him for taking photos of the unconscious Pacquiao. He had to jump off the apron to escape a further beating. Here is what he had to say courtesy of Yahoo.
“Had I not gotten off the ring, I have no doubt the two of them would have beaten the [expletive] out of me and I might have been seriously hurt,” Bello told Yahoo! Sports.
“Nobody likes doing that, but I was where I was credentialed to be and I was trying to do my job, which is to document the event,” Bello said. “It’s no different than the war photographers who have to shoot what is happening on a battlefield. Nobody wants to do that, but you have to document the history.
According to Bello, Fernandez was on the canvas crying when when he noticed Bello taking photos and went after Bello. Bello jumps out of the ring, but Fernandez still comes after him. Photos backs up the photographer story.
Keith Kizer, the executive director of the Nevada Athletic Commission who will be looking into the incident makes the best point of all.
“What I find interesting is that neither of these gentlemen, nor anyone else on Team Pacquiao, had any problems when the photographers were doing their jobs and shooting pictures of Ricky Hatton after Manny knocked Hatton out,” Kizer said.
Really that is all that needs to be said.