Oscar De La Hoya took to Facebook recently to offer his disdain for the proposed fight between Floyd Mayweather and Conor McGregor, suggesting boxing “might never recover” from what he called “a farce.”
UFC president Dana White this week questioned De La Hoya’s motives for calling a boycott of the proposed pay-per-view bout. As president of Golden Boy Promotions, De La Hoya has a lot at stake promoting the Sept. 16 PPV middleweight showdown between Canelo Alvarez and Gennady Golovkin. A potential Mayweather-McGregor fight near that date could impact sales.
Bashing Mayweather-McGregor could be more about business than a sincere concern for the welfare of boxing fans. But De La Hoya is wrong in suggesting if Mayweather-McGregor does happen, boxing will take the blow it did after Mayweather’s ultra-disappointing mega-fight with Manny Pacquiao in May 2015.
Here’s why: Boxing is in a much better place today than it was in 2015. Mayweather and Pacquiao were the only fighters with real star power then. Once Mayweather won a dominant decision and Pacquiao looked ruined, there was no one else to occupy anyone’s interest.
Alvarez, a huge star Mexico but still unproven in the United States, had lost to Mayweather in 2013 and struggled against Erislandy Lara in 2014. He wasn’t near as polished or popular as he is today. Same can be said for current champions Terence Crawford, Deontay Wilder, Anthony Joshua, Golovkin and Keith Thurman. All are established stars.
Joshua, the young British heavyweight king, and Wladimir Klitschko recently fought before 90,000 at Wembley Stadium. Errol Spence Jr. of Texas went to England last week and won the IBF welterweight title from Kell Brook before a sellout crowd of 27,000 in Sheffield.
On June 17, Andre Ward and Sergey Kovalev meet in Las Vegas in a much-anticipated rematch of their light heavyweight championship fight. And more than 40,000 tickets have been sold in Brisbane for Pacquiao’s July 2 fight with Jeff Horn in what will be the biggest boxing crowd ever in Australia.
The boxing business is booming with more established stars than it did in 2015, certainly enough to maintain the sport’s resurgence once Mayweather-McGregor comes and goes.
Boxing fans are also smart enough to know Mayweather-McGregor is more of an event than some sort of litmus test for the sport. It’s up to the consumer — boxing fan or MMA follower — to decide whether they want to watch it or not.
Mayweather, the self-proclaimed Greatest of All Time, should dominate McGregor, the best mixed martial artist on the planet, in a boxing match. The Irishman is an amateur in the eyes of the boxing world.
If the fight is one-sided as expected, how does that keep a boxing fan from watching Spence-Thurman or Joshua-Wilder or Triple G against anybody? Boxing has far more depth and substance than it did when Mayweather and Pacquiao finally got into the ring after five years of hype. Mayweather-McGregor can’t harm boxing the way Mayweather-Pacquiao did.
Once Mayweather became open to the idea, I always thought Mayweather-McGregor was going to happen. There’s too much money in play for it not to.
For some reason, more boxing traditionalists are publicly opposed to Mayweather-McGregor than those from the MMA world. There will be no leg kicks, no spinning elbows and no chance for any ground-and- pound, which takes out much of the fun for them. But hey, it’s Conor, who is always worth a watch.
The only people in the UFC upset by all this are the lightweight contenders who likely will have to wait until next year before McGregor defends his belt.
Meanwhile, the rest of us will be treated to what should be the world’s most unpredictable fight promotion. Mayweather and McGregor could each have their own reality shows in the weeks leading up to the bout. Don’t worry, Oscar, boxing will be fine.