LAS VEGAS ? Less than 24 hours after trading punches, Manny Pacquiao and Erik Morales found themselves within punching range.
But they did not exchange blows as what they had done the night before. They just swapped souvenirs.
Pacquiao handed Morales a red jacket when they bumped into each other Sunday at the baccarat table inside the Wynn Las Vegas. They were playing on separate tables and Pacquiao personally gave the item as a sign of goodwill.
Morales responded by taking off the dark blue jacket that he was wearing in front of a big number of the Filipino lefty?s supporters and fans.
Within minutes, the playing area was starting to fill up with Pacquiao fans holding cameras, pens, notepads, shirts and souvenir programs and security had to be called in for crowd-control purposes.
“No cameras please,” said one burly officer. Not even his presence was enough to persuade the people to leave the playing area as they kept on clicking their cameras and posing with Pacquiao and Morales, two gladiators who treated a sellout crowd at the Thomas and Mack Center to a night of world-class fisticuffs Saturday.
“Mr. Pacquiao wants a little privacy so if you are not playing, kindly step out,” said another officer.
Pacquiao was wearing a gray sweat shirt and had a lemon-spiked Corona beer in hand and looking as though he did not fight the night before but instead was at the nightclub dancing the night away.
On the opposite table was Morales, also in sweat shirt, with his wife Andrea beside him.
Morales also had a bottle of the fine-tasting Mexican beer which he gulped as though it was sparkling drinking water.
Compared with what Pacquiao got in his hands, stacks of high-value chips, Morales appeared content in gambling $ 25 chips although he also had with him $ 1,000 chips.
