Jean Pascal and Bernard Hopkins Say Nothing at Final Presser

Herb Zurkowsky of The Montreal Gazette has an article on the final press conference for Saturday's rematch between Bernard Hopkins and Jean Pascal at the city's Bell Centre, and he is displeased. Or disappointed. Or both.

And then, finally, following a 45-minute delay waiting for each to arrive, Hopkins arose, went to the dais and proclaimed, as he had in Quebec: "Enjoy the fight."

Moments later, Pascal rose, went up and made two statements. "Three days left," the 175-pound champ said in French. That was followed in English by: "Enjoy the fight."

There would be no media scrums. No more talking. Hopkins escaped through a back entrance into a waiting limousine. Pascal, at least, went out the front door, reportedly signing autographs before being whisked away.

This is how you sell a fight? We waited 45 minutes for this?

Mr. Zurkowsky does go on to say that "the promoters, Pascal's trainer, an executive from HBO and anyone else capable of talking coherently" did their best to save the event from being a total waste of media time, especially Richard Schaefer who went on and on about Pascal being afraid of Hopkins.

I thought maybe he was exaggerating, but then I watched some YouTube video of the conference. Nope. He's got it all about right. It's pretty boring, but for those interested, video is after the jump.