Rumors have swirled in recent weeks that Ryan Garcia was planning to sue Oscar De La Hoya and Golden Boy Promotions. It’s boxing, though, and the business is full of gossip.
On Thursday, however, De La Hoya may have guaranteed that Garcia would press charges against him even though Garcia hadn’t planned to do so in the first place.
The two found themselves in an ugly public back-and-forth on Twitter, and while De La Hoya made some good points, he failed to learn from his own fighting career when he was in angry with his promoter, Bob Arum of Top Rank.
De La Hoya sued Arum to be released from his contract. Although they later reconciled, their reunion was not as lucrative and successful as it had been in their first round.
Arum then learned that when you lose a boxer’s heart and mind, a contract isn’t worth the paper it’s written on.
And that’s what De La Hoya is about to learn with Garcia.
It all started when De La Hoya posted a tweet suggesting a fight between Garcia and Manny Pacquiao. Pacquiao’s career started in 2008 when he beat a faded De La Hoya, and so De La Hoya was probably hoping that Garcia could also build his career by beating a 44-year-old Pacquiao.
Garcia quickly responded by saying no. He then responded to a photo posted by De La Hoya in which the Hall of Famer was making fun of Rolando Romero.
Garcia had tweeted on Tuesday that he wanted to fight Romero, Isaac Cruz and Teofimo Lopez. He was clearly annoyed that De La Hoya, his promoter, posed with Romero, who is promoted by Premier Boxing Champions. PBC promoted Garcia’s big fight on April 22 with Tank Davis, starring Golden Boy.
De La Hoya tweeted at Garcia at one point, “not gonna argue on social media. When you have time to sit down, man to man, we can offer you another huge payday.
It was the smartest thing he had said in the whole conflict. And if he had stuck to it, he would have clearly been the winner and would no longer be on shaky ground with his fighter.
Instead, however, he continued to Garcia. Although it might have done him good and he might believe he was “winning” the argument, he was just burying himself.
Take, for example, when he ripped Garcia for agreeing to a pre-fight rehydration clause with Davis.
Garcia suffered his first loss, and it’s only been six weeks, and that’s a sore point for a young fighter. But De La Hoya tweeting about the rehydration clause wasn’t a wise move, even though he was right that Garcia shouldn’t have agreed to it.
But when De La Hoya wrote directly to Garcia as part of a tweet about the rehydration clause“The blame for your loss is on YOU and your ‘advisor’ Lupe,” he couldn’t have believed it was a wise choice.
Imagine a 23-year-old De La Hoya seeing such a tweet from Arum. Don’t you think De La Hoya would have gone ballistic?
Both men made their case. This is Garcia’s career, and he should be able to fight whoever he wants. De La Hoya has a long history in the fight game and has a team of skilled people who can also advise him, but if Garcia doesn’t want to fight Pacquiao then he should get to work arranging the fights that Garcia is interested in. . plug.
It’s a bad look for both of them, but Garcia can be excused because he’s a young man with no loss or boxing experience. He is still clearly emotional after his loss and De La Hoya needs to read the piece better. Sometimes the best thing to say is nothing, but De La Hoya just couldn’t do it on Thursday.
In response to a fan, De La Hoya said his contract with Garcia was “binding”, but while we agree that’s true, that doesn’t mean a whole lot. He can’t force Garcia into the ring, and every month that passes without Garcia fighting is a net loss for Golden Boy.
De La Hoya sometimes needs to be saved from himself, and this was one of those instances. He should know a fighter’s mind better than any other promoter, but he couldn’t find the strength within himself to walk away from his phone.
If Garcia files a lawsuit to terminate his contract, whether he succeeds or not, you can look back to the Twitter “conversation” between Garcia and De La Hoya on June 1 as the reason for the fallout.