In a great story by Colin Morrison of NYFights.com, Morrison reflected upon Oscar De La Hoya's activity compared to modern-day fighters. De La Hoya, an Olympic Gold medalist, who as Morrison chronicles in his story faced Julio Cesar Chavez, Pernell Whitaker, Ike Quartey, Felix Trinidad, Shane Mosley, Bernard Hopkins, Floyd Mayweather Jr, and Manny Pacquiao.
Beyond that De La Hoya fought from lightweight all the way up to middleweight, competing in five different weight classes.
The simple thing that made De La Hoya great was two-fold, beyond skill - it was will and willingness. De La Hoya fought the best, and fought often - both which we rarely see in the modern era.
Modern fighters could get a break to a certain extent as we just don’t have the same amount of TV dates as we used to, though De La Hoya at times fought on Michael Carbajal to stay active. Modern fighters are much more selective and protective of not obtaining a loss on their record as well as want the paycheck that comes with main eventing a card, rather than staying active.
What do we get? A slew of inactive fighters with half-decent resumes, and a smaller footprint in boxing’s history as we know it.
De La Hoya, who is often seen as the guy who could never win the big fight, but could fill up any venue, and bring more women to the sport of boxing than any other fighter in history, also never turned down a challenge. Beyond that, De La Hoya won a world title in only 12 fights, a feat only a few fighters can match or beat with Vasyl Lomachenko being someone who comes to mind as a modern one who won a world title with fewer fights. It is easy to say now, but we didn't appreciate Oscar De La Hoya, or what Oscar stood for as a fighter.
De La Hoya is more than likely the greatest Mexican-American boxer of all time and embodied a generation with his fighting style. In the early 90’s, in the era of the blackbox, De La Hoya was one of the fighters who wasn’t a heavyweight that people loved to see, and he was the face of a generation in the ring.