Newly-crowned International Boxing Organization flyweight king Dave Apolinario paid a visit to the king of the ring over the weekend in General Santos City.
Holding his IBO strap, Apolinario posed for pictures with Manny Pacquiao, who, for a short time, also reigned as IBO titleholder more than 13 years ago.
Apolinario, a native son of General Santos City, had won the IBO 112-lb diadem last month, knocking out Gideon Buthelezi of South Africa unjust one round before a highly-partisan crowd in East London.
Pacquiao was IBO junior-welterweight ruler in May 2009 when he flattened British Ricky Hatton at the MGM Grand in Las Vegas.
Promoted by GenSan boxing patron and tuna tycoon JC Mananquil and managed by Mike Pelayo, Apolinario is being primed for bigger things before the year comes to a close.
“We’d like to see him take on the division’s big names,” Mananquil said.
Though the IBO title is not widely recognized yet like the World Boxing Council, World Boxing Association, World Boxing Organization, and the International Boxing Federation, its former titlists included not just Pacquiao but heavyweights Lennox Lewis, Wladimir Klitschko and Anthony Joshua, Roy Jones Jr., Bernard Hopkins, Marco Antonio Barrera, Naseem Hamed and even Floyd Mayweather.
