By: Sean Crose
“We’re targeting mid November,” Oscar De La Hoya said to Fight Hype in a recently published interview. “We’re having ongoing discussions with his team. We’re having ongoing discussions with DAZN, and we’re nailing down a venue and opponents. Then we’ll hopefully announce very soon.” De La Hoya and his team are “targeting” mid November for the return of the highly popular Ryan Garcia. Although the young Californian suffered his first loss – via knockout at the gloved hands of Gervonta Davis – his last time in the ring, De La Hoya feels it’s time to start thinking of Garcia’s return.
“Anywhere Ryan goes he will fill up an arena,” said De La Hoya. “All we do as promoters is try to navigate what’s best for his career, so he can get to the top, to the elite top.” De La Hoya was asked if the legal battle he’s been having with Garcia – who claimed to be unhappy with the way De La Hoya and company had been handling his career – had come to a satisfying conclusion. “I can’t really talk about what’s going on now, but everything will be resolved,” he said. “I just feel we had a little bump in the road but everything will be smoothed out.”
De La Hoya went on to indicate that Garcia has certainly done well for himself fighting under De La Hoya’s Golden Boy Promotions’ banner. “He’s right there,” De La Hoya said of Garcia. “He’s a bona fide true star in boxing…he just did over two million homes on pay per view with Gervonta Davis for a reason.” What’s more, De La Hoya also indicated that the defeat to Davis shouldn’t end up being too damaging to Garcia’s overall career. “Yes, he’s coming off a loss,” he said of Garcia, “but you’re as good as your last fight. So, if we get him back on a winning streak he will be back on top of the world.”
Although he’s recently suffered his first loss, De La Hoya believes there could be a big event for Garcia in the near future. “There’s a huge weekend,” he said, “Super Bowl Weekend…and we’re talking to some people, and I strongly feel that the only fighter who can headline such an event would be Ryan Garcia.” Of course, a fight of that size would mean Garcia would have to fight a top or at least well known opponent. “Obviously it all depends on the opponent,” De La Hoya said. “It has to be for a world title. It has to be a big name (Teofimo Lopez and Adrien Broner were two of the names mentioned during the course of the interview).
“He’s still in the driver’s seat,” De La Hoya said of his fighter, making it clear Garcia remains one of the biggest names in the sport.
