By Sammy Rozenberg
After months of heavy buildup, the sold-out crowd at the MGM Grand in Las Vegas, filled with high profile celebrities and athletes, saw Floyd Mayweather, Jr.(38-0, 24KOs) put an exclamation mark on his legacy by winning a split decision over Oscar De La Hoya to win the WBC junior middleweight title, his fifth title in his fifth weight class.
When tickets went on sale on January 27, they sold out in three hours and produced a Las Vegas gate record of $19 million dollars. We knew right away the fight would be big, but nobody would have predicted just how big it became. It was dubbed right away as the fight that carried the sport of boxing on it's shoulders.
Even with all of the public pressure to put on a great fight - both men delivered.
The mind games lasted for months between both fighter and they did not stop on the night of the fight. Mayweather came down to the ring wearing Mexican colors, and wearing a sombrero as rapper 50-Cent performed his entrance music.
The fight was close during the first six rounds, as most expected. De La Hoya pressured Mayweather with his size and strength. Mayweather used his quick reflexes to make De La Hoya miss and countered to make him pay. De La Hoya would flurry in the final 30 seconds to steal some rounds, but it was not enough.
Mayweather took over the fight in the second half with his accuracy and speed. De La Hoya targeted the body well, but could not slow Floyd down. Oscar was unable to get off with left hook all night long, his money punch. As De La Hoya began to tire in the final three rounds, Floyd began to target him with power punches to the head and body. De La Hoya, feeling a sense of urgency, tried to rally in the final round.
The counter right hand, and straight right hand of Mayweather were the punches that De La Hoya could not avoid all night. There was little drama in terms of brutality, neither man was ever hurt, and there was little toe to toe action. But, the fight was not boring, both men fought their fight and sent the crowd home happy.
The final scores were 115-113 De La Hoya, 116-112 Mayweather and 115-113 for Mayweather.
Mayweather said after the bout that he still plans to retire and De La Hoya is his final fight.
"I still plan to retire. I don't have anything left to accomplish. I won five titles in five weight divisions. Oscar was tough. I said it would be easy work and I made it easy work," Mayweather said.
De La Hoya felt that he won the fight.
"I felt I won. I landed the hard punches, the crisper punches. I pressed the fight. If I didn't press the action there would be no fight," De La Hoya said.
Family Affair
The Mayweather family brought a soap opera atmosphere to the pre-fight buildup and became the focus by many media outlets that were covering the fight for the last few months. Floyd Mayweather, Sr. was the trainer of Oscar De La Hoya for six years. He was replaced in January with well known trainer Freddie Roach. Floyd Sr. wanted a hefty $2 million dollar sum in order to train Oscar for the fight with his son. De La Hoya felt the sum was too excessive and turned him down. Floyd Sr. claimed that he never truly wanted to train a fighter to beat his son, and De La Hoya turning him down was a blessing in disguise.
When the eleven city press tour began, Floyd Sr. reunited with his son after several years of being distant and trading profanity laced insults in the press. Earlier this year, Roger Mayweather, head trainer for nephew Floyd Jr., was serving a prison sentence for a minor assault charge. While he was incarcerated, Floyd Sr. was helping train his son for De La Hoya. Not long after Roger was released, he began to feud with his brother over the training duties of Floyd Jr.
It wasn't long before the Floyd Sr. bailed from his son's camp and began to attack brother Roger in the press. The dysfunctional Mayweather family saga made for quality programming as millions tuned in to the De La Hoya-Mayweather 24/7 reality program to watch all the past and present infighting that made the series so interesting to the audience.
What Now?
Mayweather has been calling out Oscar De La Hoya since he began his career at the super featherweight limit of 130-pounds. Over the years, he dominated the competition at super featherweight, lightweight, junior welterweight and welterweight - winning four titles in all four weight classes. Now he beats De La Hoya to win a title in his fifth weight division, joining an elite class of fighters to achieve such an accomplishment. Mayweather says that will move forward with retirement, but few believe him. There are just too many opponents and too much money to be made. At 30-years-old and at the top of his game, Mayweather will likely return - very soon.
De La Hoya, a six-division champion and arguably the biggest draw in the sport for the last few years, plans to continue his career, but his list of potential opponents is very small. Rumors persist that a rematch with Felix Trinidad is in the cards. Coincidently, Trinidad was at ringside for the fight. The two met in 1999, with Trinidad winning a controversial majority decision. The fight produced 1.4 million pay-per-views, the current record holder for a non-heavyweight attraction.
The Aftermath
More so than the actual fight. The overall number of pay-per-view buys will be the deciding factor in the eyes of many outside of the boxing public, as to whether or not the sport can be saved. There has been so much emphasis on the performance of the pay-per-view, that a low number will fuel the rhetoric of the critics who believe that boxing is a dying sport.
If the pay-per-view does less than 1 million buys, it will be viewed as a failure. Even if the pay-per-view performs below expectations, the amount of publicity it has brought to the sport is unbelievable. The front page magazine covers, the thousands of articles in national newspapers, television appearances, radio coverage, etc. For the first time in a long time, people everywhere were talking about a fight in the sport of boxing. It almost felt the golden age of the sport, when a major boxing event was viewed as the one of biggest sporting events in the world.
It proves that when two marquee names in the sport are matched against one another, it spells for headlines and media fireworks. Thousands of fans attended the eleven city press tour and close to 7,000 came to the weigh-in.
People can say what they want, but it took two people to sell the event. When you match two big names, fringe title belts and undefeated records go out the window. The public only cares about the actual fight and the small stuff is not important. It takes two great fighters to make a great fight. Possessing great fighters is not the problem for the sport. The sport has great fighters, but not enough fighters that are recognizable to the average boxing fan.
The bigwigs of the sport will have to capitalize on the opening this fight has given them and produce more big fights in order to build up the names of more fighters. Skills do not necessarily translate into popularity. Erik Morales and Marco Antonio Barrera are two of best in the history of the lower weight classes and never caught on with a majority of the boxing public. They brought excitement and had plenty of signature fights, but the average fan could not relate to them. Some might say it was a language barrier, others might say they were just too small. The real reason probably has to do with charisma.
In the current era of the sport, a fighter not only has to be skilled, be exciting in the ring and keep on winning - he also needs a charismatic personality to appeal to the average fan.
"May 5 will bring a big opportunity for the sport and a big responsibility," says Richard Schaefer, CEO of De La Hoya's Golden Boy Promotions. "We want this fight to go down as the night that saved boxing."
Only time will tell.
On the undercard;
In a very lackluster performance, Rocky Juarez (26-3, 19 KOs) returned to the featherweight limit to win a twelve round unanimous decision over Jose Hernandez (22-3, 14 KOs). Juarez dropped Hernandez in the second round, but there wasn't too much action in the fight. The scores were 115-112, 116-111 and 117-110.
In a battle of unbeaten super bantamweights, Rey "Boom Boom" Bautista (23-0, 17 KOs) of the Philippines won a unanimous twelve round decision over Sergio Medina (28-1, 22 KOs) of Argentina. The fight had plenty of action as both fighters were not afraid to engage. Medina was dropped in the sixth round by a counter. In round seven, Bautista was given a standing eight-count by the referee after he was rocked so bad that he kept himself from falling by holding onto the ropes. Bautista came back in the eleventh round to knock Medina down again with another counter punch. The final scores were 115-109, 116-108 and 115-109.
The bout was a WBO super bantamweight eliminator, making Bautista the mandatory challenger to champion Daniel Ponce De Leon of Mexico.
Undefeated Alex Banal (13-0-1) scored an eight round unanimous decision over Juan Rosas (25-3). The scores were 78-73, 78-73 and 76-75.
Undefeated super featherweight Billy Dib (16-0) won an eight round decision over Jose Alberto Gonzalez (14-4). The scores were 78-74, 78-74, 77-75 win.
John Murray (21-0) stopped Lorenzo Bethea (6-5) in the seventh round.
In what some call a big upset, especially overseas, Christian Solano (20-11-4) knocked out previously unbeaten welterweight John O'Donnell (15-1) in two rounds. O'Donnell could not get away from Solano's left hand. He was dropped by the left in the first round, and knocked out by the left in the second. Promoter Mick Hennessy was recently calling O'Donnell the best fighter with Irish heritage since Barry McGuigan
