It’s the biggest money fight of the year and HBO is pushing the fight with the 24/7 specials which were a huge reason as to why De La Hoya/Mayweather did 2.4 million pay per view buys. Without the Mayweather’s I’m not sure this special can be as interesting, but HBO is so great with their productions, they could have something up their sleeve.
De La Hoya is running in Big Bear with a “Ring” jacket.
He says Big Bear makes him feel at home and re-engergizes him. It pumps him up.
Pacquiao says it’s the biggest moment in his boxing career. Freddie Roach says he’s ferocious. Roach trained De La Hoya for the Mayweather fight last year. De La Hoya says that Roach came into the fight with the wrong game plan. Roach says he lost because of a reason, but he’s not telling. He’s going to use it against him.
De La Hoya looks to be using some football training for his sprint work. He’s also doing electrostimulation which sends an electrical charge from his shoulder to hand. It moves the blood and energy around to find blockages.
Eleven of Pacquiao’s team members live in a two bedroom condo. They live to serve him and follow him everywhere. Roach says that Manny is special to him and he’s a product of the best work he’s ever done.
Roach says Pacquiao will over train if you let him. Pac says that if you train hard, the fight will be easy.
Tomorrow night, we have two fairly decent sized title fights.
Juan Manuel Marquez and Joel Casamayor are fighting for the lightweight champion with Sergio Mora and Vernon Forrest underneath. Marquez is coming up to lightweight, hoping to secure a third fight with Manny Pacquiao and faces the lineal champion in Casamayor. Casamayor could possibly get a fight with Pacquiao if he’s impressive in victory.
Of course, that’s after Pacquiao’s big fight with Oscar De La Hoya at the end of this year.
Mora and Forrest are fighting for Mora’s newly won junior middleweight title, which he beat Forrest for earlier this year. Forrest looked well on his way to beating up the smaller Mora, but about mid way through, the fight changed and Mora looked quicker, slicker, and just outpointed him the rest of the way. All of a sudden, Forrest looked all of his 37 years old. It will be interesting to see which Forrest we’ll get because we know which Mora we’ll get. He’s always been “The Latin Snake”. Will Forrest be “The Viper” though?
Also, TNA has a PPV this weekend. No Surrender features a four way for the belt between Samoa Joe, Kurt Angle, Christian Cage, and Booker T. They are teasing a Jeff Jarrett return, and if you go to TNA’s website they are also teasing Mick Foley. Foley left WWE last month after his contract ran out. He was Jim Ross’ Smackdown announcing partner and said that part of his reason for leaving was because of Vince McMahon yelling at him through his headset.
If they waste Foley’s return without using him to sell the show, it’s a huge mistake.
Though UFC and WWE are no where to be found this weekend, it’s still going to be a pretty good weekend of action.
I’ve talked about Oscar De La Hoya’s 2008 plan before, but let’s do a short recap.
He was going to fight Steve Forbes in the spring, which he did. Then he was going to follow that up with a rematch against Floyd Mayweather Jr. in the fall, and then one more fight in Los Angeles in December to end his career.
Part one of his plan worked out as his “tune-up” bout that wasn’t called a “tune-up” bout against Forbes ended with him winning a one sided decision. But part two never happened. Somewhere along the way, Floyd Mayweather Jr. walked away from a huge purse and retired.
(With the recent negotiation struggles to find a fight, as well as Manny Pacquiao initially turning it down because he wanted a bigger split, I don’t think it’s wrong to wonder if Mayweather Jr. retiring had something to do with a similar struggle with Camp De La Hoya. I’m not sure if negotiations even started, but it’s something I’d wondered before.)
He had a great plan. He was going to fight three times this year and end his career with a bang. He was going to fight a tune up bout in the spring to get him ready for his rematch with Floyd Mayweather Jr., who beat him in 2007. It was the biggest money fight of all time, and though the second fight more than likely wouldn’t have done the same business, it would’ve been the biggest fight of this year. And then, in December, he was set to end his career with one more fight, possibly in his home town.
Part one of the plan went to fruition. De La Hoya beat Steve Forbes in May to set up his fight with Mayweather. But Mayweather Jr. decided to retire instead of take the fight.
(According to Dave Meltzer’s Wrestling Observer there were early talks for both De La Hoya and Mayweather Jr. to be involved in this year’s Wrestlemania to help sell their fight for later this year. Obviously, De La Hoya wasn’t involved in Wrestlemaina, but Mayweather Jr. was.)
