FanHouse Joe Santiago

Two days after guiding Manny Pacquiao to Saturday night's historic victory over Miguel Cotto in Las Vegas, trainer Freddie Roach was back in Los Angeles, where he runs the famous Wild Card Boxing Club.

And even as he worked with another world champion, Amir Khan, as well as other prospects, the Hall of Fame trainer and three-time Trainer Of The Year took the time, on Tuesday, to answer the gym's telephone.

"I'm a little bit tired, and a little bit drained right now, but I can't show that to the fighters," said Roach, speaking against the gym's background noise of the bustling boxers pounding on the heavy-, and speed-bags, as well as the ringing bells of those who were sparring. "Once I get into the gym, I work through it."

A former trainer for Bernard Hopkins, Mike Tyson, Oscar De La Hoya, Virgil Hill and James Toney, among others, Roach took a break long enough to share Q&A time with FanHouse.

The 49-year-old boxing guru shared his views on Pacquiao's overall talents, Cotto's future, his intense relationship with Cotto's trainer, Joe Santiago, and how he would like his pound-for-pound best fighter to close out his illustrious career.

LAS VEGAS - While there was little drama during Friday's weigh-in between the competitors, Miguel Cotto and Manny Pacquiao, there was an incendiary, obscenity-laced verbal exchange between their respective trainers, Joe Santiago and Freddie Roach, before a boisterous crowd of about 6,500 fans at the MGM Grand Hotel's Garden Arena.

Cotto (34-1, 27 knockouts) is defending his WBO welterweight title, a weight-category whose standard is 147 pounds. But since Pacquiao (49-3-2, 37 KOs) is rising from a lower weight, they have agreed to a contracted catchweight of 145 pounds.

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Throughout the promotion leading up to Saturday night's mega-fight between challenger Manny Pacquiao and his champion fighter Miguel Cotto, trainer Joe Santiago's reputation has taken a verbal beating from his counterpart, Freddie Roach.

A Hall of Fame cornerman whose hopes to guide Pacquiao to an unprecedented, seventh world title in a different weight class, Roach has taken shots at Santiago's relative inexperience.

But during Wednesday's press conference at the Hollywood Theatre at the MGM Grand Hotel where Saturday night's clash will be held, Santiago stepped up to the podium and carried himself the same way that he has throughout the fight's buildup.

With a confidence, a calm demeanor, a calculated speech and, ultimately, control.

On Saturday night, Miguel Cotto, will walk into the same Las Vegas hotel arena where, sixteen months ago, the Puerto Rican fighter suffered the worst beating of his professional boxing career.

And as sure as he knows he'll be at ringside delivering his commentary for Cotto's matchup at the MGM Grand, HBO's Jim Lampley is equally certain that Cotto is going to shed blood, yet again, opposite Manny Pacquiao.

"Of course, [Cotto's] going to bleed in this fight. Unless it's only going to go a minute. Otherwise, if we're in round three, he's cut," said Lampley, who has been ringside during the many times when Cotto has bled, profusely, from facial lacerations.

Champion Miguel Cotto has a message for challenger Manny Pacquiao as well as those who believe he can be successful during his quest to win a world title in a record seventh different weight class: "They picked the wrong guy."

"If he thinks he's going to reach a seventh title in a seventh different division, he picked the wrong moment, the wrong fighter and the wrong opponent," said Cotto, all but bristling during Thursday's conference call with the national media.

"If he thinks he's going to beat Miguel Cotto," said Cotto, "he's pretty much all wrong with that kind of thinking."