By Allan Fox: After 9 years out of the ring, former 6-division world champion Oscar De La Hoya says he’s secretly training in hopes of facing UFC star Conor McGregor in a boxing match. The 44-year-old De La Hoya says he’s strong and as fast as he’s ever been in the past, and he believes he can knockout the 29-year-old McGregor in 2 rounds at the most.
De La Hoya (39-6, 30 KOs) was stopped in the 8th round by Manny Pacquiao in his last fight on December 6, 2008. De La Hoya retired following that defeat.
Floyd Mayweather Jr. made huge money fighting McGregor last summer in stopping him in the 10th round on August 26 at the T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas, Nevada. Massive amounts of boxing and MMA fans gladly purchased the Mayweather-McGregor fight, paying $100 per household without complaints. The 40-year-old Mayweather came out of a 2-year retirement to take the money fight with McGregor.
The casual boxing and MMA fans might not have realized that Mayweather had been retired, and was nowhere near the same talent that he’d once been. Mayweather looked very old, and over-the-hill against McGregor. It didn’t matter thought. Mayweather was still able to walk McGregor down and eventually stop him in the 10th round. McGregor had never fought a boxing match before, and he didn’t have the conditioning to go more than 4 rounds. After the 4th, McGregor was done. He had nothing left.
“You know I’m competitive,” De La Hoya said to Golden Boy Radio. “You know I still have it in me. I’ve been secretly training. Secretly training. I’m faster than ever, and stronger than ever. I know I could take out Conor McGregor in two rounds. I’ll come back for that fight. Two rounds,” said De La Hoya.
The big question is will McGregor go for the idea of fighting De La Hoya? McGregor wants a rematch with Mayweather, as he figures he can beat him the second time around. Mayweather hasn’t said anything about wanting to return to the ring for a second fight, but he has some boxing fans believing that he will come back to fight McGregor again.
Mayweather recently was working out in gull sparring gear at his gym in Las Vegas. If Mayweather wants to fight McGregor again, he’s not going to let De La Hoya take that fight without him stepping in front of him to grab the fight first. If McGregor gets beaten by De La Hoya, then there’s no way the boxing and MMA fans will want to purchase a second Mayweather-McGregor fight.
“Just one more. I’m calling him out. Two rounds – that’s all I need. That’s all I’m going to say,” said De La Hoya. “He’s a big Irishman! He’s the king. He’s the king. Hey, let’s get it straight: in the cage, he would freakin’ destroy me. He would destroy me! No, [the fight would have to be] in the ring. I’ve been working out for the last five months,” said De La Hoya.
As bad as McGregor looked against Mayweather, De La Hoya will destroy him. De La Hoya has so much knowledge of fighting. It wouldn’t be fair. De La Hoya could beat McGregor a number of ways. If De La Hoya wanted to play it safe, he could jab him into submission. That’s not De La Hoya’s style. He’s more of a combination puncher, and he’ll look to take him out with a flurry of shots in round or 2.
Mayweather appeared to carry McGregor for a number of rounds before he started to walk him down and slowly wear him out. It looked to some boxing fans that Mayweather took it easy on McGregor so that the UFC fighter wouldn’t be destroyed so quickly. The fans would have been furious if Mayweather had blown McGregor out in one or two rounds.
It would be interesting to see if De La Hoya can still bring in the fans after being out of the boxing ring for almost 10 years. The younger fans of the sport likely have never seen De La Hoya fight, so they might not be enthralled at paying to see him fight McGregor. The older boxing fans would probably want to see De La Hoya and McGregor face each other.
De La Hoya’s fan base has obviously grayed, and there might not be enough of them left to want to pay to see him fight McGregor in an event fight.
De La Hoya is going to look like a hypocrite if he faces McGregor, because he came out early and was negative about Mayweather fighting the UFC fighter. De La Hoya saw it as being bad for the sport of boxing that Mayweather was fighting a novice in McGregor on PPV. If De La Hoya turns around and does the same thing, it puts him in the same situation as Mayweather.
De La Hoya’s net worth is $200 million. If He can get a McGregor fight, he might be able to add $100 million to his large fortune. Mayweather is said to have made a huge amount of money from the McGregor fight. There’s talk that Mayweather made $300 million. If De La Hoya can make just one-third of that amount, he’d still be making a tremendous amount of money. It would easily be De La Hoya’s biggest payday of his pro career. Despite being a hugely popular fighter, De La Hoya never made the kind of paydays that Mayweather has received fighting Manny Pacquiao and McGregor. This would be De La Hoya’s big chance to make a killing with dough fighting McGregor if the UFC fighter agrees to the idea.