Oscar still huge PPV puncher...

By Dan Rafael
ESPN.com



Oscar De La Hoya, who stormed to the a sixth-round TKO of Ricardo Mayorga last Saturday night in Las Vegas, still has the golden touch.


Boxing's biggest attraction flexed his box-office muscle, too, by drawing a surprisingly high 875,000 pay-per-view buys and $43.8 million in revenue, HBO PPV announced Wednesday.


De La Hoya scored an electrifying knockout win against Mayorga to win a junior middleweight title in his return from a 20-month layoff that followed a knockout loss to Bernard Hopkins. Apparently, boxing fans missed "The Golden Boy."


It was the fifth best-selling fight of the 17 HBO PPV cards that De La Hoya has headlined. It trails only De La Hoya's 1999 welterweight unification bout against Felix Trinidad, which generated 1.4 million buys and $71.4 million in revenue, both all-time records for a non-heavyweight bout; De La Hoya's 2004 bout against Bernard Hopkins (1 million buys, $56 million); his 2003 rematch with Shane Mosley (950,000, $48.4 million); and his 2002 junior middleweight unification fight with rival Fernando Vargas (935,000, $47.8 million).


De La Hoya's top five pay-per-view events are also the top five non-heavyweight PPV events in boxing history.


With 875,000 buys, De La Hoya's all-time pay-per-view figures increased to a mind-boggling 10,390,000 buys and $488.1 million in revenue.


The buys for De La Hoya-Mayorga -- which come from the United States, Canada and Puerto Rico -- consisted of 475,000 from cable systems and 400,000 buys from satellite homes. When all the buys are counted, the figure are expected to increase slightly.


Before the fight, pay-per-view experts projected that the fight would generate somewhere in the 650,000-buy neighborhood, which still would make it the most successful boxing event of the past few years.


"With his triumphant return to the ring, Oscar De La Hoya rocked the arena and the living rooms of pay-per-view households across America," HBO PPV's Mark Taffet said. "He reminded us that not only is he still a phenomenon, but he's bigger than ever."


De La Hoya, 33, is considering retirement but has also left the door open for a career finale Sept. 16. Given the rousing success last week's fight, it's hard to imagine De La Hoya walking away.


De La Hoya has said that if he fights again, he'd like to face Trinidad in a rematch or pound-for-pound king Floyd Mayweather Jr., a fight filled with juicy storylines given that Mayweather's father, Floyd Sr., trains De La Hoya.


HBO replays De La Hoya-Mayorga on Saturday night (9:45 ET) along with a live bout featuring junior welterweight champ Ricky Hatton of England making his HBO debut challenging welterweight titlist Luis Collazo in Boston.


Dan Rafael is the boxing writer for ESPN.com.


Love him or hate him Boxing will definetly miss the Golden Boy

Every boxer from 147-154lbs will have to pay homage to Oscar if they remotely want to be noticed.

If they want a pay day, Oscar is the man. If they want good fights, they will have to go through Oscar's promotion company. Oscar is going to have a virtual monopoly in the welterweight and superwelterweight division.

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Originally Posted by BigMix27

Every boxer from 147-154lbs will have to pay homage to Oscar if they remotely want to be noticed.

If they want a pay day, Oscar is the man. If they want good fights, they will have to go through Oscar's promotion company. Oscar is going to have a virtual monopoly in the welterweight and superwelterweight division.

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everyone knocks on oscar not being a thugg. abusing his opponents in press and assaulting them at press conferences and about the phony smile. it has all paid dividends in the end

Quote:

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Originally Posted by chamiley

Quote:

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Originally Posted by BigMix27

Every boxer from 147-154lbs will have to pay homage to Oscar if they remotely want to be noticed.

If they want a pay day, Oscar is the man. If they want good fights, they will have to go through Oscar's promotion company. Oscar is going to have a virtual monopoly in the welterweight and superwelterweight division.

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everyone knocks on oscar not being a thugg. abusing his opponents in press and assaulting them at press conferences and about the phony smile. it has all paid dividends in the end

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Exactly. He paints a pretty picture for boxing... a picture that casual and potential fans will take a liking to and begin to watch our sport. Guys like Mayorga are exciting for us who already know what the sport is about. To potential fans, media, and casual fans... it just proves the stereotype that boxing is just a sport filled with thugs and low lifes.

800,000?

:puke: