It has been eight years since Oscar De La Hoya last laced up a pair of gloves but the fighting talk has not left him now that he is working as a promoter. After Gennady Golovkin had brutally stopped David Lemieux in eight rounds in New York to unify the WBA and IBF middleweight titles in the early hours of yesterday, De La Hoya declared that he was ready to put up Saúl “Canelo” Álvarez to match the Kazakh, in potentially the richest bout of 2016.
Lemieux is promoted De La Hoya’s Golden Boy company, but Álvarez, the 25-year-old Mexican, is his biggest star. Álvarez challenges Miguel Cotto for the WBC middleweight on November 21. Cotto has steered clear of Golovkin for the past two years, but Álvarez would be up for the challenge.
“Canelo will be ready,” De La Hoya said, before adding “eventually”. “They have to fight and Canelo told me he wants GGG.”
The only moment of doubt for Golovkin against Lemieux came in the fifth round, when a body shot knocked the Canadian to the floor and Golovkin followed up with a shot when he was down. He received just a ticking off for that, but was otherwise completely dominant.
With Floyd Mayweather supposedly retired and the likes of Manny Pacquiao, Juan Manuel Márquez, Cotto and Wladimir Klitschko approaching the end of their careers, boxing is looking out for the next superstar.
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Golovkin says that he is not interested in moving up in weight until winning not only the WBC belt, but the WBO title that Andy Lee defends against Billy Joe Saunders in Manchester on December 19.
“I want to win all the belts; now I have two,” he said. “I’m staying at 160 [lb] until I have all the belts.”