Oscar de la Hoya

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Oscar de la Hoya
Statistics
Real name	Oscar de la Hoya
Nickname	Golden Boy
Weight	Light Middleweight
Nationality	American
Birth date	February 4, 1973
Birth place	Montebello, CA
Style	Orthodox
Boxing record
Total fights	42
Wins	38
Wins by KO	30
Losses	4
Draws	0
No contests	0

Oscar de la Hoya (born February 4, 1973 in Montebello, CA) — nicknamed the Golden Boy — is a Mexican American boxer who won a gold medal for the United States Boxing Team at the Barcelona Olympic Games and considered one of boxing's all time greats. Oscar de la Hoya became Ring Magazine's "fighter of the year" in 1995 and Ring Magazine's best "Pound for Pound" fighter in the world in 1997. His fights throughout his entire career have generated a total of almost half a billion dollars in Pay-per-view sales alone [1] [2]. He is also the only fighter in the history of boxing to win world titles in six weight classes, of which he has won eleven total.

During his amateur career, de la Hoya's record was 223-5 with 163 knockouts. He was the United States' top Olympic boxing hope when his mother was diagnosed with breast cancer. She died at age 35. On her death bed, he promised her that he would win an Olympic gold medal.

[edit] Childhood

De la Hoya was raised as the son of Mexican immigrants in impoverished circumstances in East Los Angeles, California. At the age of eight he was the youngest fighter to win first place in Freewill games. He never lost a fight for 4 years, 5 months until he met Marco Rudolf who was the best fighter from Germany at the time. He avenged the loss in the Olympics by winning the gold medal. He had an impressive record in the amateurs with 223 wins, 5 losses and an impressive 163 knockouts, a record matched by only a handful of other boxers in history.

[edit] Career

Oscar de la Hoya.

On November 23, 1992, de la Hoya made his pro debut. He went on to win titles in 6 different weight divisions and beat former and current world champions Troy Dorsey (KO 1), Jorge Paez, (KO 2), Genaro Hernandez (TKO 6), John John Molina (W 12), Rafael Ruelas (TKO 2), Julio Cesar Chavez (TKO 4, KO 8), Miguel Angel Gonzalez (W 12), Jesse James Leija (KO 2), Pernell Whitaker (W 12), Hector "Macho" Camacho (W 12), Ike Quartey (W 12), Arturo Gatti (KO 5), Francisco Javier Castillejo (W 12), and Fernando Vargas (KO 11). His losses include a controversial majority-decision loss to Félix Trinidad and two decision losses to Shane Mosley. He has been stopped once in his career by the larger Bernard Hopkins (KO 9).

On September 14, 2002, Oscar fought his nemesis "Ferocious" Fernando Vargas. After fiercely competitive early rounds, Oscar seized control of the latter half of the fight. In round 11, Oscar de la Hoya dropped Fernando Vargas with a left hook. Fernando Vargas got up at the count of nine, but de la Hoya finished him with a barrage of punches forcing the referee to stop the fight at 1:48 of round 11 (TKO 11). It was later revealed that Fernando Vargas had tested positive for steroids in his post-fight drug test.

On May 3, 2003, as part of the Cinco de Mayo festivities, he retained his WBC and WBA world junior middleweight championships when the corner of former world champion Yori Boy Campas threw in the towel, and officially gave de la Hoya a seventh round knockout win. On September 13, he and former rival Mosley met once again, in Las Vegas, and Mosley once again took away de la Hoya's world title belts with a controversial 12 round unanimous decision over de la Hoya. Compubox numbers found that de la Hoya outlanded Mosley by a wide margin. de la Hoya threatened to have an investigation launched after the decision.

de la Hoya next challenged Felix Sturm for the WBO world middleweight title on June 5, 2004. He was awarded a unanimous decision, to become the first boxer in history to win world titles in 6 different weight divisions. After that, he hoped to unify that title with the three other world middleweight championships, held by Bernard Hopkins, on September 18.

He lost to Hopkins by a ninth round knockout. A left hand to the body sent him to the canvas, knocking de la Hoya out for the first time in his career. Hopkins would later join de la Hoya's Golden Boy Promotions, a boxing promotion firm.

De la Hoya faced WBC world junior middleweight Ricardo Mayorga on May 6, 2006 at the MGM Grand in Las Vegas. He won this bout by a TKO in round 6.

De la Hoya said that he will not fight again in 2006 but will not retire. He has offered Floyd Mayweather, who is the unified welterweight champion and pound for pound number one in the world, a fight on May 5, 2007 which Mayweather accepted. This fight is expected to be the biggest non-heavyweight fight in the history of boxing. It will be contested for de la Hoya's WBC Junior Middleweight title.

[edit] Amateur Highlights

1992 Olympic Card.

• 1990 Gold Medalist U.S. Olympic Cup

• 1990 Gold Medalist Goodwill Games

• 1990 Gold U.S. National Championships

• 1991 Gold Medalist USA vs. Olympic Festival

• 1992 Gold Medalist USA vs. Boxing National Championships

• 1992 Gold Medalist USA vs. Bulgaria

• 1992 Gold Medalist World Challenge

Amateur record: 223-5 with 163 knockouts

[edit] Professional Record

[edit] Life Outside the Ring

Cover to Oscar de la Hoya's self titled CD from EMI International. Released October 10th, 2000.

De la Hoya is one of the favorite boxers of American cable channel HBO, where he formerly produced a popular Spanish-language boxing show called Boxeo de Oro. De la Hoya's interests outside the ring include architecture, acting, fashion designing, and singing. He designed his own house in Big Bear Lake, California, has one clothing line through Mervyn's department stores), and released a Grammy-nominated CD, entitled Oscar de la Hoya. Released through EMI International on October 10th, 2000, the self-titled CD is a Latin Pop album with thirteen tracks in both English and Spanish.

He married Puerto Rican singing superstar Millie Corretjer on October 5, 2001, and lives in Los Angeles and Puerto Rico. Their first child, Oscar Gabriel, was born on December 29, 2005, in Puerto Rico. de la Hoya has three other children: Jacob (b. February 18, 1998) by a woman whose identity is unknown; Devon de la Hoya (b. November 30, 1998) by former Las Vegas show girl Angelicque Mcqueen, and Atiana Cecilia (b. March 29, 1999) by actress Shanna Moakler.

In the summer of 2004, de la Hoya starred in and hosted a boxing reality television series on Fox and Fox Sports Net titled The Next Great Champ.

In April 2005, de la Hoya and a Southern California real estate developer, Highridge Partners, formed a real estate investment partnership, named Golden Boy Partners, to invest in Latino neighborhoods.

In September 2005, de la Hoya's wallet was stolen by a pickpocket. The wallet contained a $1 food stamp coupon, a reminder of his poverty-stricken childhood in east Los Angeles which was very important to him.

[edit] See also

• List of Olympic medalists in boxing
• List of lightweight boxing champions
• List of male boxers
• List of WBC world champions
• Ring Magazine pound for pound
• Featured Athlete on Fox Sports Net's Beyond the Glory

[edit] External links

• Oscar de la Hoya
  • Official Site
  • Golden Boy Promotions
  • Oscar de la Hoya Fans Club
  • Oscar de la hoya's Professional Record
  • Twighlight of the idol - Oscar de la Hoya