Live from the MGM Grand at Pacquiao-Hatton

Welcome to the MGM Grand, people, which is cooking with some serious gas tonight as we crawl ever closer through this utterly uninspiring undercard towards the main event tonight, the unfortunately titled Battle of East and West between Manny Pacquiao and Ricky Hatton. I just arrived at the press room after having dinner at the HBO pre-party at Wolfgang Puck’s, a scene that was littered with boldface names - Jeremy Piven of Entourage fame, David Arquette (of Courteney Cox fame), Bryan Cranston of Breaking Bad, and seemingly the entire cast of True Blood, Anna Paquin and Stephen Moyer among them, all huddled together at a table in the corner drinking primarily Acqua Panna and not, disappointingly, blood.
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↵Top Chef guru Tom Colllichio was also on the scene, being interviewed by the omnipresent Mario Lopez right after he interviewed boxing guru, Bert Sugar. Gurus only for Lopez, evidently. He did not, however, interview the great guru of sleaze, Joe Francis, who also was on the scene with a group of impossibly long-legged, short-skirted companions who, for the time being at least, were not going wild. “When did he get out of jail?” I overheard from one table that was ogling the ever-classy Mr. Francis.
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I’m under the impression that the names I’ve listed above are but a footnote to the list of glitterati on hand at the Grand tonight. I’m watching the big monitor and I see that Jack Nicholson is posted right behind Oscar De La Hoya, so you know the A-list, and even the list above the A-list for which there is no letter, is in the house tonight. I was talking to Monica Sears earlier, Golden Boy’s Public Relations Coordinator, and she told me that there had been such an eleventh-hour deluge of requests for tickets from celebrities that many of them were being turned away. “There’s no tickets, there’s no hotel rooms, it’s absolutely crazy,” she said.
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↵It feels crazy. The Hattonites always add a strong element of supercrazy to any gathering, with the air always vulnerable to a sudden eruption of the unbelievably annoying Hatton theme song, “There’s only ONE RICKY HATTON...” sung to the tune of “Winter Wonderland.” As I roamed the casino earlier this afternoon losing my money in scattershot fashion, I did my best not to listen to the endless refrain, knowing that I have maybe seven or eight thousand more renditions of that ditty ahead of me. Miles to go before I sleep indeed.
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↵The final undercard bout is about to get under way, thank goodness, so I’m going to head to my seat at ringside. I’ll try and get back at you with an update before the main event goes off, but if I don’t, definitely check back here after the fight for my full recap.↵