Today is October 7, 2007, a day with two sevens on it. While the number “7” is mostly associated with luck (as in Lucky 7), this date is not about luck or being fortunate, it is about being “super” as in “super sports Sunday” as Manny Pacquiao would once again battle Mexican living legend Marco Antonio Barrera in a grueling 12-round fight. Manny Pacquiao appears to be the strong favorite not only here in his own country but also even in Las Vegas and that’s understandable. The 5-year difference in their ages would for certain show and be telling in this fight. It had in fact showed when they first boxed in Texas and the older Barrera just couldn’t take the Pacquiao rock solid punches into the body and head. Maybe he was just unprepared at that time to face a virtually wet-in-the-ears young boxer that Manny was then. And maybe Barrera comes into the ring this time more prepared than before. And maybe, a miracle would happen in Las Vegas today.

But in general, this fight is over. Manny is just too strong a puncher for an old horse like Barrera.

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Tiger Woods Won Another Major —How many times have I heard this phrase before on CNN or read about it on Yahoo News! —I could merely count the ways.

Winning the 89th US PGA Tour Championship is simply phenomenal for him and this would inch him closer to the record held by Jack Nicklaus who had garnered 18 major golfing titles in nearly half a decade of playing professional golf. At age 31, Woods now has 13 major titles tucked under his belt and is fastest among any other player (alive or deceased) in raking in majors and if he continue at this rate, he’d overcome the all-time record in no time at all. He merely needs 5 more major tournament wins and there are four of such each year. At one time he won all four in succession, one after another, and I have a feeling he could do that once again easily in the coming months.

To date, Tiger Woods has more major titles than all top ten golfers in the world combined. In winning this one, he had a tremendously exceptional 9-under par performance on the third round and he is the first player in seven tries to ever make par at the very difficult 18th hole of Southern Hills on the final day. This year, he won five tournaments when no other player had won twice or more.

Just when I thought he was slowing down, Tiger Woods came roaring back with this US PGA Championship win and this only shows how he is a phenomenon through and through.

Festi-val \Fes”ti-val\, n. A time of feasting or celebration; an anniversary day of joy, civil or religious.

Slugfest\ S-lug-fest\, n. a lot of boxing—may mean bloodshed.

It is definitely a slugfest—this boxing event that would come to local television this morning care of ABS-CBN. The World Cup of Boxing featuring six Filipino boxers pitted against six Mexican boxers could prove to be as rambunctious as a karaoke bar melee and could possibly be as vicious. This boxing event is a first of some sort for we’ve never heard about any world cup competition in professional boxing, pitting a nation against one. This might be history in the making for certain and it is unprecedented to be sure. In yesterday’s weigh-in, Filipino and Mexican supporters came in droves with placards and banners. The atmosphere was so vibrant that you thought Brazil was going up against Germany in a soccer world cup competition.

Despite that in actuality this World Cup of Boxing is basically a title fight between nimble Filipino Upstart Rey “Boom-Boom” Bautista against Mexican champ and stalwart Daniel Ponce De Leon, it is wholly novelty as a sports event.

On the one hand, the decision to make this a Philippine against Mexico boxing competition (instead of Bautista versus Ponce De Leon title match) may understate its title fight importance for certainly, we’ve never heard of any world cup in boxing; unlike in football or tennis. It feels half the time like a WWF wrestling special event where fights are phony and often ridiculous. This made me wish that the organizers have toned down the “world cup” angle and focused on Bautista’s most difficult challenge to date, in light of his stature as a possible mainman and national hero like Manny Pacquiao.

This should be a Bautista-Ponce De Leon title match basically and a sprinkling of undercards that happens to all involved Filipinos and Mexicans in either side.

Be it as it may seem—the organizers of this eponymous World Cup of Boxing are perhaps intrigued by the idea of creating another interesting idea about professional boxing, about finding our what country is the best in the sports of boxing today. This particular time, it is whether Philippines can be a better boxing nation than Mexico. Perhaps USA and Cuba would jump in and join the fray later on and decide to be called as the best boxing nation of all. Thailand would surely be thinking of this if Philippines or Mexico boasts of boxing supremacy when the dusts are cleared after this World Cup of Boxing event in Sacramento, California. The fact that this event is being held in Sacramento poses some credence to this one-of-a-kind competition plus the $500,000 grand prize that goes for the team winner—plus the “cup” of course. And the whole world might be watching with extreme eagerness.

Could this spur a new era and form of competition in boxing? It is too early to tell. Would the Philippines come up with more wins out of the six matches? I do hope so.

Though it may be true half of the time, “sports unite nations” is mostly a cliché that had been utilized to the hilt through the years; at times just to add theme to a sporting event and then nothing more, like school graduation ceremonies, they always have to have a theme etched in cardboards with close parenthesis and pasted on stage foregrounds.

But this time, sports can actually unite a nation, even for just a moment. When the Iraqi national football (soccer) team clinched the Asian Cup last night, Shiites in southern Iraq went to the streets to celebrate the win by a team composed mainly by Arab sunnis and a lone Kurdish player. And all over Iraq, it was observed that general violence were absent for nearly a day. Now that’s sports not only for unity, but also for peace in a place where peace is but a strange idea.

Let’s talk sports. The 12-man Philippine basketball team is set to play at the FIBA Asia Men’s Championship tournament starting at 5:00 P.M this day, tousling with the much improved team from Iran. Thus, the so-called Philippine Olympic quest to send a basketball team to Beijing next year begins.

We have always known how China and South Korea had been lording basketball in the Asia region and generally, our team have played so laggardly against their tall and more agile players, losing by an average of 20 points. 20 points is huge in basketball and losing that much is often embarrassing.

But now, it is a little surprising to see a Philippine team that is not only so quick with their court movements but also can shoot from long-range as often as a winning team wants. Their performance in the recently-held William Jones Cup in Taipei had been surprising to say the least as they exhibited newly-found swiftness and accuracy from the field and defeating South Korea in the process, the very team that had caused a major heartbreak when we lose to them upon a late shot in the dying seconds in Busan Asian Games of 2002. Maybe, our quest of establishing a stronger presence in the basketball scene in Asia has improved by leaps and bounds.

Only there is an issue with the composition of this new Philippine basketball team as it is membered heavily by fil-am players like Danny Seigle, the very young Gabe Norwood, PBA Rookie of the Year Kelly Williams, Mike Pennisi and Asi Taulava. Read this very lively discussion in Boxing Scene. Ang tanong, dyahe ba na magpapadala tayo ng isang team na me halong fil-americans sa Tokushima? In my mind, it wouldn’t be so much of an issue. If other Asian teams have a problem with a Philippine team with Filipino Americans on the roster, then they should have no business in trying to qualify for the Olympics or the world championship where real Americans such as Kobe Bryant, Shaquille O’Neal and Tim Duncan would be playing.

The only issue in my mind this time is the usual lack of height of the Philippine basketball players, despite the inclusion of meztisos from America, where in the game of basketball would still be might for a shorter player, even if he can shoot at will, won’t hit even the net with a hulking opponent putting up a huge umbrella-like defense in front of him.

But the Olympics would always be there or the world championships. If not now, there’d be always a next time and with a quicker team and more fluid offense, hope would always be high.

Aren’t we all glad that we live in a tennis era where Roger Federer is playing in his topmost form? I for one feels that way. Just like being able to witness the rise of Tiger Woods and his phenomenal run through majors after majors. Surely, I’ve asked myself how it would have felt to ever see a young Jack Nicklaus mopping every competition from the field, year after year more than half a decade ago and since we could not bring back time and since there still no cable television at that time; I just contented myself with merely wondering. But I am sure glad that Tiger Woods had made golf such an exciting sport to watch with a phenomenal gameplay that is both astonishing and magical.

So is with the extremely skillful Roger Federer who just won his fifth straight Wimbledon title hours ago, surpassing another legendary Swiss player Sweden’s legendary tennis player in Bjorn Borg who was watching at the stands in the All England Club. Federer had stated how it made him so emotional to have his idol and compatriot watching him play and if you ask me, that is just how feel-good movies feel like, only that this is for real. And we could not blame Roger (Can I call him Roger?) if he feels like he is living a fairy tale story, having a fairy godfather watching by the stands, witnessing every moment that success comes to him—like this time, winning in the All England Club after a match that proved to be the toughest for him in years with Rafael Nadal showing how he could be a real threat to his phenomenal run.

Yet, it should not be Bjorn Borg’s record that Roger was priming at. I feel so much that it is Pete Sampras amazing 7 Wimbledon title that he is aiming at. He is aiming for the best and he looks like he is never gonna stop until he reaches the apex of tennis glory. To be the best among the best.

The way he that he had played at this latest Wimbledon finals, there’s more reason to anticipate how he could break Sampras’ record in the soonest time possible. If you ask me, there is just nothing like him out there and I do not see any other player that could match his prowess on the court—except perhaps on clay where he becomes a lesser tennis player (like every grass specialists had been such as Pete Sampras and Andre Agassi). His returns are so prolific that I have never seen such kind of accuracy in a player before, as if he had robotic eyesight that could designate a point at the other end of the court and then exactly bring the ball towards that point, like a Tomahawk missile guided by a programmed computer; hitting the target with enormous accuracy. To me, that is his greatest weapon. And this is the reason why Andy Roddick could not be fast enough to catch a return placed so far from where he stands guard and that’s why Nadal’s serve had many times been broken by this amazing return that Roger has. The only player that could perhaps effectively counter these spot-accurate returns is Boris Becker, the one player who could dive and run on the court like an agile Puma—but sadly, he had already retired and had grown older.

That way—with no notable rival on sight—Roger Federer would certainly continue his phenomenal run on grand slam titles and would break every record that there is to break. He is just terrific. American legendary tennis player John McEnroe had once described him as a player that is so above the rest, a player playing in another level entirely, one that shoos in a different tennis altogether—one that we’ve never seen before.

This seems somehow to be a scary thought—especially if one is an ATP-ranked player who have grand slam ambitions—but I am enjoying it nonetheless. To Roger Federer—I take my hat off for you and a thousand applause goes with that.