If you’ve ever gone to a bar to watch a pay-per-view fight, you know how it goes. Most customers drink heavily through the undercard, shadow box with the table beside theirs during the introductions, and then cheer lustily for whichever guy reminds them of themselves. They also enjoy it when the opponent, the guy less like them, is bloodied or rendered unconscious.
While they may not make tasteful companions, these customers probably tell serious fans something about ourselves and why we appreciate certain prizefighters more than others. Deep beneath our references to strategy, left hooks, or training footage lies a similar search for sameness. Our tastes may be more refined, but we also tend to favor pugilists who we believe are like us.
Why, then, do I cheer for Oscar De La Hoya?
My first boxing hero was Marvelous Marvin Hagler. That made sense; I was a young kid from Massachusetts, and Marvelous Marvin was the Middleweight Champion of the World from Massachusetts. Though Marvelous Marvin and I shared few similarities in appearance or upbringing, I figured we had harsh winters and determination in common. But about the only thing I have in common with Oscar De La Hoya is age.
Coincidentally, I have that much in common with Ricardo Mayorga, too. And yet, this Saturday night at MGM Grand, when he defends his WBC light-middleweight title against Oscar de la Hoya, Ricardo Mayorga won’t have my vote. But neither did Julio Cesar Chavez, Ike Quartey, Felix Trinidad, Fernando Vargas, or Shane Mosley. I’ve always cheered for Oscar.
There are reasons not to cheer for Oscar De La Hoya, I realize. From the moment he left the amateur ranks and became a prizefighter, Oscar was well marketed. Perhaps the original Oscar action figure was simply Bob Arum’s masterwork. And since then, De La Hoya has sometimes appeared smug and insincere. He’s made questionable choices: the final rounds against Felix Trinidad; the comments after his second loss to Shane Mosley. And I still don’t know who’s culpable in Oscar’s spat with Top Rank.
But for all that, Oscar De La Hoya happens to be a western incarnation of the American dream. The odds of a young man from East Los Angles earning hundreds of millions of dollars, legally or otherwise, were so long. From a very young age, Oscar de la Hoya had to make the perfect choice, hundreds of times, to become what he is today. And though he’s made mistakes and lost fights, he’s never failed as a professional.
In recent years, he’s also brought a novel approach to fight promotion. By entering into partnerships with Bernard Hopkins, Shane Mosley, and Marco Antonio Barrera, Oscar has begun to empower prizefighters in a much-needed way that few insiders anticipated. And there have now been enough Golden Boy Promotions cards to report his company’s match-making and presentations are top notch. As a promoter, Oscar has arrived early and stayed late.
But what I find most appealing about Oscar De La Hoya is his willingness to be heroic. He’s fully aware how much he means to many people, and he openly talks about not failing them. He may speak in as many clichés as the next celebrity athlete, but in the end Oscar allows others to hold him accountable for the self-aggrandizing promises he makes. And that’s rare.
It looks rarer still when compared to the antics of Oscar’s Saturday opponent. In reality, Ricardo Mayorga is probably half the villain he’s played these last few months. He has borrowed liberally from the promotional shticks of Fernando Vargas and Mike Tyson; there seems to be irony in Mayorga’s madness. And where it was once possible to believe Vargas detested De La Hoya over some imaginary slight or Tyson would eat Lennox Lewis’s children, Ricardo Mayorga’s lunatic hatred of Oscar De La Hoya feels contrived.
But it could work. Whatever Mayorga actually thinks of Oscar, the nearer their fight draws, the truer Oscar’s anger at Mayorga seems. Both are businessmen, and press conferences are about generating pay-per-view purchases one way or another; but more and more, Ricardo Mayorga appears to be putting Oscar De La Hoya in a place where UD-12 won’t sate the Golden Boy.
That, of course, is Ricardo Mayorga’s plan. He is not in Oscar’s class as a boxer or a slugger. For all the accolades he won after frightening Vernon Forrest into submission forty months ago, how many opponents has Mayorga knocked-out since then? Zero. Oscar De La Hoya’s left hand will be, by far, the most dangerous weapon in the ring Saturday night.
The only trouble that could arise for Oscar would be a desperation to beat Ricardo Mayorga more severely than Felix Trinidad did. That outcome is unlikely and could lead Oscar to take needless risks. But so long as he fights Ricardo Mayorga the way he fought Fernando Vargas, there’s a good chance Oscar will beat Mayorga the same way he beat Vargas – thoroughly.
Once that work is finished, Oscar can start to plan his farewell fight. He already has El 16 de Septiembre, Mexican Independence Day, reserved and ready. Most any prizefighter weighing more than Jorge Arce and less than Hasim Rahman would want the payday of being Oscar’s final opponent. But Floyd Mayweather Jr. could fetch a purse like no other.
Finally, whatever happens this Saturday night or this September, before the end of the year boxing will bid goodbye to an American hero. Oscar De La Hoya will retire from the ring as a very wealthy man with his countenance and wits intact. Then he will continue to enrich our sport as both a promoter and an emissary. And that’s why I cheer for Oscar.