Oscar De La Hoya is widely considered to be one of the greatest fighters of his entire generation.
Known as ‘The Golden Boy’, De La Hoya entered the paid ranks back in the early 1990s after he walked away from the 1992 Olympic Games in Barcelona with a lightweight gold medal.
The Mexican-American great would go on to capture world titles in no less than six weight divisions throughout the course of his 16-year professional career, racking up legacy-defining victories over the likes of Julio Cesar Chavez, Pernell Whitaker and Hector Camacho amongst many others.
De La Hoya’s career eventually came to an end after he was defeated by Filipino legend Manny Pacquiao at the end of 2008. He announced his retirement shortly after, shifting his focus to his promotional career under the ‘Golden Boy Promotions’ banner.
There was another fight that De La Hoya could have had though, as speaking to Club Shay Shay, he shared details of an agreement that had been in place for a rematch against Floyd Mayweather, although this didn’t come to fruition.
“Well, this is something that the world doesn’t know and I’m gonna actually say it now. We had a rematch for a year, contractually. Guess what Floyd did? He retired for a year and one day. The contract expired.”
He was then asked if he believes he could have gotten revenge over the five-division world champion, effectively admitting that he would have had no chance of winning.
“No, no. My body was breaking down. My body was over it, that was the last straw. I felt it in the 7th and 8th round because my jab is my weapon, I throw my jab and nobody can beat me and I just couldn’t throw it so it was over, my body was breaking down. I fought [Manny] Pacquiao and I was a dead man walking.”
Mayweather defeated De La Hoya via split decision when they clashed at the MGM Grand Garden Arena in Las Vegas back in May of 2007, capturing the WBC super-welterweight title in the process.
