De La Hoya-Mayorga Prefight Press & Predictions

[GorDoom]

Mayorga-De La Hoya presser!

February 28, 2006

By Whit Haydon from Fight News


The fireworks continued between Oscar De La Hoya and Ricardo Mayorga Tuesday afternoon at the Beverly Wilshire Hotel in West Los Angeles. If the media and all in attendance were looking for free entertainment from Mayorga, they got it in great abundance, as Mayorga reeled off a series of quotes and antics that would make a longshoreman blush.

"On May 6th I'm going to make you my bitch", shouted Mayorga, clad in an exquisite Matador's outfit. ""No one will recognize you. You remind me of an old lady past his prime sitting in a rocking chair doing nothing." he shouted as loud as he possibly could despite jeers from random members of the 150 or so in attendance.

"This clown sitting to the right of me has disrespected me. My strongest hand is my right hand, see his eye? I'm going to use it to detach his retina.....You're going to be my bitch in my bed anytime I want you. I hate bitches and I'm going to make you my little bitch."

Mayorga looked down from the dais at De La Hoya, who appeared to be seething. Trying to get a rise out of him, Mayorga feinted at the golden boy, who did not flinch despite Mayorga's hand coming within an inch.

The antics continued as Mayorga stood on his seat and made crotch grabbing gestures toward the crowd and De La Hoya, shouting "I'm the one with the balls. You (Oscar) don't even know how to represent your own people. (All the latin people) will be rooting for me on May 6th."

Mayweather Sr. then went to the podium and went off on Mayorga.

"Sit your bum ass down. If you put your hands on me you're going out."

Mayorga kept screaming. Mayweather kept challenging him but nothing happened.

King interruped "We're never even going to make it to May 6."

De La Hoya finally took the podium and had very little to say, but his comments were very pointed. "This will be...................... the fight of my life." said De La Hoya. "I've never had anger except for one guy out there, and he got knocked out" (obviously referring to Fernando Vargas).

Turning to Mayorga with fist clenched: "I'm going to knock you out - Credo - Believe me. Credo. You have disrespected me, my wife, and my people and I will knock you out." (translated from Spanish).

Earlier the two had come in separately, and the face-off came and went without incident. De La Hoya came in with almost a presidential flair, very businesslike. Two minute later it was Mayorga coming in with his incredible attire and usual flamboyance that added more than a mid-sized level of electricity through the room.

Don King said he is aiming for an unprecedented two million PPV buys at 49.95 a pop on this one, drawing laughter from some, yet King never backed off.

"Two million is nothing is a pittance compared to the worldwide population" King said.

King had fun as Mayorga's promoter, promising that De La Hoya "will have to endure the powerful pummeling of the nuclear tank before him (in Mayorga)."

The bout will be for Mayorga's 154 lb WBC crown at the MGM Grand in Las Vegas on May 6th in what could likely conclude the career of Oscar De La Hoya regardless of what happens in the ring.

[GorDoom]

De La Hoya's Mayorga ordeal over for now!
Week on insults from Nicaraguan strongman ends in NYC

March 3, 2006

By Matt Richardson from Fight News

The trash talking that is the Oscar De La Hoya - Ricardo Mayorga promotional press tour made it's fourth and final stop Thursday afternoon in New York City and predictably did not fail to entertain the masses.

Mayorga (28-5-1, 23 KO's), the WBC Junior Middleweight title-holder had slapped De La Hoya in the back of the head at a press conference earlier in the week in Chicago, but refrained from any physicality's on Thursday. This did not mean, however, that he controlled his mouth. The former welterweight champion spewed such venom that a seated De La Hoya grew noticeably angrier and angrier as his face turned flush and his jaw bone became more defined. "This guy has no idea what he got himself into," De La Hoya (37-4, 29 KO's) would tell some members of the press later on.

The press conference surprisingly began the way most fights do: with both fighters being introduced, their accomplishments well lauded while their respective teams cheered their fighters on as the boxers entered. De La Hoya entered from the right side of the ESPN Zone restaurant in Manhattan to the sound of Mexican music. He looked trim and in shape and is probably right around the 154-pound weight limit. Mayorga then came in from the same location. Dressed in a white suit with a white fedora, the Nicaraguan pounded his chest, waved his WBC belt and yelled in Spanish. He walked to the dais (where De La Hoya was seated next to fellow Golden Boy promoter Bernard Hopkins) and confronted the "Golden Boy." De La Hoya rose from his seat and an exchange of words in English and Spanish occurred. For a brief minute it looked like the two would get it on right there but the commotion subsided and Mayorga took his seat on the opposing side of the dais.

"The campaign thus far has been electric," said Don King who promotes Mayorga and is therefore promoting the May 6 HBO PPV card. "You're going to need some kind of stimulant to calm the energy from watching this fight," said the always loquacious King. "It's going to be something to behold," King continued. "I don't need to hype the fight, these guys do it themselves. We are going to bury the boxing end of his (De La Hoya) career. It's the mourning of a history of a past and the beginning of a new history."

"He's a gun slinger," trainer Stacy McKinley said of his pupil Mayorga, who along with Yoel Judah will train Mayorga for this bout. "A gun slinger comes to fight. We're going to fight and we're going to take him out," he said. "It's about who's the gun slinger with the fastest draw and the straightest shot," retorted King, never missing an opportunity.

It was Mayorga, however, who expectedly made the most outlandish and inappropriate comments of the day when he took to the podium. "I would like for everyone to know that I don't come to make friends with Oscar De La Hoya," stated Mayorga thru a translator. "I want him to know that he has to respect me. I'm the champion, you're nothing,"

Mayorga said while pointing at De La Hoya. Mayorga said De La Hoya didn't know if he was a "promoter, fighter or queer." He also compared De La Hoya to "your Olympic teammate Greg Louganis." Louganis, for those who are unfamiliar, is an openly gay Olympic diver who won medals in the Olympics in the 1980's. The fact that Louganis and De La Hoya were never even in the same Olympics, let alone the same sport, though was lost on Mayorga. "I never had a problem hurting queers," Mayorga said as De La Hoya glared straight ahead. "Don't come with excuses like you always do," Mayorga continued. "Your hand hurts, your back hurts, your butt hurts. My dad asked me to detach your left retina and I always keep my promises." Mayorga's tirades were sprinkled with the word "maricon" a derogatory Spanish term for homosexual.

When De La Hoya finally took to the podium his demeanor was much different compared to his opponent's. "I have to admit, I'm a bit tired of hearing this guy," De La Hoya conceded. "I've never heard anything like it. It's a bit funny. I've never hated anyone more before and that was a guy who got knocked out," De La Hoya said in an obvious dig at his old rival Fernando Vargas. "I want to go 12 rounds," De La Hoya said as he turned toward Mayorga. "In the last minute I want to knock you out."

JABZ

De La Hoya (who opened Las Vegas odds as a 3 and a half to 1 favorite) openly admitted to the press afterwards that he picked Mayorga as his first opponent (since being knocked out by Hopkins in September 2004) precisely because the Nicaraguan would get under his skin. "This guy has no idea what he's gotten himself into now that I really, really hate him. It's back to business. He has no style, he has no finesse. This is all about dissection."

"You can't talk about pay-per-view without mentioning Oscar De La Hoya," said HBO PPV's Mark Taffet. And he's right. According to Taffet, De La Hoya's fights have combined nearly 10 million pay-per-view buys and approximately a half-billion dollars in revenue. King is hoping to break the all-time pay-per-view record for a non-heavyweight fight (the record belongs to De La Hoya's loss to Felix Trinidad on September 18, 1999 which generated 1.4 million buys) though that's unlikely. Still De La Hoya's crossover appeal (and the big bucks that come with it) can not be underestimated. This guy is a big money-maker and the sport will (and does) suffer in his absence. Or how else can you explain the presence of mainstream sponsors such as Bacardi, Coca-Cola and Southwest Airlines, all of whom are sponsoring this bout.

De La Hoya, who along with Mike Tyson and Ray Leonard, has been the biggest star in the sport since Muhammad Ali. But his glorious (and prosperous) career could be coming to an end soon and he insists this is his last year in the squared circle. If he should beat Mayorga in May he already has a September 16 HBO PPV date on the calendar. Speculation has Floyd Mayweather Jr. in the opposite corner that night should Mayweather beat Zab Judah on April 8. When asked about this De La Hoya said of Mayweather "he's on top of my list." Even if that means dealing with De La Hoya's estranged promoter Bob Arum? "If he's involved it probably won't happen," said De La Hoya. But if the dream match-up does take place it could take place at welterweight ("I can make '47 easy" Oscar says). And what about that other storyline? You know, the one about De La Hoya's trainer actually being the father of "Pretty Boy" Floyd. "We've talked about it, he doesn't have a problem with it," De La Hoya said.

The fight will be televised live from the MGM Grand and tickets are on sale now. Ticket prices range from $150 to $1250 and are apparently going fast (8,000 tickets were sold in the first 18 hours).

QUOTE OF THE DAY: "It ain't no diggity and it ain't no doubt, Oscar will knock you out." -- Trainer Floyd Mayweather Sr. in his typical pre-fight poem, predicting victory for his charge. He also had some other lines in his poem rhyming with "class and trash."


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[GorDoom]

Wallace Matthews from Newsday

Boxing's pitiful battle between class and crass


March 3, 2006

The disease that is killing boxing strutted into a midtown Manhattan restaurant yesterday. It came dressed as a pimp, threatening all manner of mayhem but in reality capable of little more than bluster.

Everything that is wrong with the fight game was on display, alongside one of the few things that is right about it.


And while Oscar de la Hoya, who represents what boxing ought to be, is quite likely to wipe out Ricardo Mayorga, who fights for the dark side, when they meet for Mayorga's junior middleweight title on May 6 in Las Vegas, not even de la Hoya can wipe out the ugly truth of what boxing has become.

That truth is there are far too many Mayorgas and not nearly enough de la Hoyas to save a one noble and important sport.

Even pro wrestling realizes that for every heel, it needs a hero. Boxing, on the other hand, eviscerates its heroes and celebrates its heels.

Mayorga, a Nicaraguan whose arrogance far exceeds his competence, turned what should have been a routine pre-fight news conference into an ugly display of everything that has turned corporate America - and by extension, network TV and the American sports public - away from the sport of Ali and Frazier, Louis and Schmeling, Evander Holyfield and the Sugar Rays, Robinson and Leonard.

Under the dubious guise of "fight hype," Mayorga insulted de la Hoya's Mexican heritage. He questioned his manhood no less than 17 times by unofficial count. He vilified de la Hoya's late mother and ridiculed de la Hoya's wife. In his blustering stupidity, he even ripped his own wife, and caught a blistering de la Hoya counterpunch in return.

"You're as pretty as my wife," he said to de la Hoya, who at 33 still looks like the kid who played Moondoggie in the old "Gidget" movies.

"Your wife's not that pretty," de la Hoya shot back, which shut Mayorga up, but only for the moment.

"My dad asked me to detach your left eye retina," Mayorga said. "And I've always kept all my promises to my father."

Well, at least he's a dutiful son.

What Mayorga is not, however, is a very good fighter, which made yesterday's display of clumsy trash talk all the more offensive. Certainly, Roberto Duran and Mike Tyson, to name just a couple, have engaged in similar pre-fight rhetoric, but at least theirs was backed up by a legitimate air of menace.

Compared to them, Mayorga - a powerful but crude brawler who fights as if he were trying to smash gnats with a sledgehammer - came off as just a street punk with a dirty mouth.

"He's just a dog who won't stop barking, but he never bites," de la Hoya said. "It's kind of funny, actually."

But de la Hoya never cracked a smile.

"It's really difficult to hold back," he admitted. "The guy's gotten under my skin. I've never hated a person the way I hate this guy."

Any true boxing fan should hate Mayorga and what he stands for, which is the ever-worsening degradation of a sport that is cruel enough inside the ropes. As he carried profanely on, his promoter, Don King, chortled encouragingly at his side, and his interpreter-slash-attorney seemed to take relish in translating every time Mayorga spat the word "maricon" at de la Hoya.

"It's a shame boxing has to be this way," de la Hoya said. "It's embarrassing."

And to think that not too long ago, it looked as if de la Hoya could inject some fresh enthusiasm into the sport.

Throughout the 1990s, de la Hoya was the crossover star of pay per-view boxing, a refreshing counterpoint to the freak show appeal of Tyson. His 1999 fight with Felix Trinidad drew nearly 1.5 million pay-per-view buys, the most ever for a non-heavyweight bout, and the atmosphere before his fights rivaled the hysteria of Beatlemania.

But then the backlash began. All the canards we had heard about Ali and Leonard came back again. Oscar was too pretty. Oscar didn't really want to be a fighter. Oscar was a phony. Instead of embracing Oscar, much of the boxing community rejected him.

And before long, another decent guy found that a sewer is no safe place to swim. De la Hoya was stopped by Bernard Hopkins in 2004 and disappeared. He hasn't fought since, content instead to concentrate on his promotional company, Golden Boy, in which Hopkins is a partner, and he won't fight much longer.

"Just two more fights and I'll retire," de la Hoya said yesterday. "I'll knock this guy out and fight one more big one, maybe against Floyd Mayweather, and that's it."

Just what boxing needs. One less good guy. Far too many creeps.

[GorDoom]

De La Hoya, Mayorga go on the offensive with verbal jabs

By Chuck Johnson, USA TODAY

"The Golden Boy" is back in his element. Oscar De La Hoya will return to the ring at the MGM Grand in Las Vegas on May 6, when he challenges WBC super welterweight champion Ricardo Mayorga in a scheduled 12-rounder that's shaping up to be a grudge match.

&nbsp &nbsp &nbsp &nbsp &nbsp &nbsp &nbsp &nbsp Ricardo Mayorga, left, and Oscar De La Hoya stare each other down Thursday in New York. They'll actually face off May 6 in Las Vegas.&nbsp &nbsp &nbsp &nbsp
By Stan Honda, AFP/Getty Images
After spending the past three days publicizing the fight in Los Angeles, Houston and Chicago, the two fighters had heard enough from each other by Thursday, when their four-city tour ended with a contentious news conference in New York.

A noted trash talker, Mayorga (28-5-1, 23 knockouts) went on the offensive by insulting De La Hoya's manhood.

"I want him to know he has to pay respect to me," said Mayorga, who will be making his first title defense since August, when he won the vacant crown with a unanimous decision against Italy's Michele Piccirillo.

"I'm the champion; he's nobody," Mayorga said.

"He has no idea what he's got himself into," De La Hoya responded. "I was expecting all this, but I didn't dislike him. Now that I hate him, I'm going back to the gym and it's serious business."

De La Hoya (37-4, 29 knockouts) was a gold medalist in the 1992 Olympics and has won world titles in six weight divisions. When he meets Mayorga, he will be shaking off an 18-month layoff. De La Hoya's previous fight ended with a TKO loss against then-middleweight champion Bernard Hopkins in December 2004.

"I lost to a great middleweight champion, but I didn't like that I went out that way," said De La Hoya, who has found success outside the ring as a boxing promoter. His Golden Boy Promotions has added Hopkins, among others, as partners in his firm, which is copromoting the Mayorga fight with Don King Productions.

"It's a chance for me to become a world champion again and retire as a world champion," De La Hoya said.

Mayorga, whose last loss was a TKO against Felix "Tito" Trinidad in October 2004, sees it as the biggest fight of his career.

"I thought Felix Trinidad would be the defining fight of my life, but it didn't turn out the way I wanted it to," he said. "Now I'm getting a chance for redemption. I must win this fight for me, the people of Nicaragua and everyone in the world who loves me because of the way I fight."

The De La Hoya-Mayorga fight will be telecast on HBO Pay-Per-View (9 p.m. ET/6 p.m. PT, $49.95).

Big fight weekend

Unbeaten Puerto Rican sensation Miguel Cotto (25-0, 21 KOs) returns to the island Saturday night to defend his WBO light welterweight championship against Italy's top-ranked Gianluca Branco (36-1-1, 19 KOs) at Ruben Rodriguez Coliseum.

The 140-pound scheduled 12-rounder will be telecast live on HBO (10 p.m. ET) after the replay showing of Shane Mosley's 10th-round junior middleweight TKO of Fernando Vargas last Saturday in Las Vegas.

There's another big fight Saturday night in Manchester, England, where IBF champ Jeff "Left Hook" Lacy (21-0, 17 KOs) of St. Petersburg, Fla., and WBO champion Joe Calzaghe (40-0, 31 KOs) of Newbridge, Wales, put their belts on the line in a 168-pound unification battle (Showtime, 9 p.m. ET, delayed on the West Coast).

[Roberto Aqui]

Well, don't know where he got it, but Mayorga managed to come up with a large pic of a bull with his horn stuck up a matador's rump sphincter. It was about the only funny thing he's done lately.

It seems Mayorga always has a propensity for "mariconizing" his opponents verbally, and then never delivering physically. Mayorga has doubtless stiffed a few cross dressing maricons in his day judging his history.

Regardless, Oscar should handle this ape easily. Guess Mayorga will always have a puncher's chance, but Oscar should be able to whack him out within 10.

[jyoungfan2]

Mayorga alone has created enough interest for me to want to watch this fight. Then again I'm a sucker for pro-wrestling. The guys built his career on people willing to pay to see his but kicked. He's laughing all the way to the bank. I saw him outside the garden after the trinidad fight. He was actually a nice quiet guy who signed autographs for anyone who asked him.