Talking Pascal Needling, Heredia, VADA

By Michael Woods

Jean Pascal is a bit of a curious figure.

The Montrealer is a bit of a character and that side of him has been on display these last couple months as he's publicly roasted foe Sergey Kovalev for saying racially insensitive remarks.

He's used a banana as a prop, to underscore inappropriate cracks made by Kovalev, and has been referring to Freddie Roach as his “white trainer,” simply to keep reminding people of Kovakev's impolitic language missteps.

That has been his go to needling material for this fight, to run on HBO; last year, when him and Kovalev tangled, he poked at the Russian by publicly demanding he embrace stringent PED testing. This, while using the services of controversial strength and conditioning and supplements guru Memo Heredia…

For those curious about such sidebar storylines, Heredia is still with Pascal. And the PED testing for this rematch is under the auspices of VADA.

A Team Pascal person told me Pascal is pleased that stringent testing is being employed and the Haitian-born light heavy is happy to be picking up the tab, thus insuring this peace of mind.

The back and forth and needling recedes at the Bell Center soon, though. The issues get clarified in violent fashion then. Subplots scatter and what matters, in an event put together by Main Events and Interbox, is who is the physical superior to who.

This I will say: the curious character that is Jean Pascal is not a bad promoter. He's been solid at stirring the pot. Winning the fight, though, that will be harder to achieve.