De La Hoya Blog: Why Mayweather is so big

Say what you will about Floyd Mayweather: The man knows how to push people’s buttons, which translates into ticket sales and pay-per-view buys. Oscar De La Hoya explains in this week’s blog posting why he thinks Mayweather has become his own heir as one of – if not THE – biggest draw among American boxers today.


Floyd Mayweather gets it. He’s a fighter who really understands the entertainment aspect of the game. Nobody else out there really does. We have great fighters in the sport but they don’t get it. Mayweather is probably the only one who knows what it takes to make truly big events.

For instance, during his media day Wednesday in Las Vegas, he arrived in an armored truck. He bought it and had it painted black, the “Money” Mayweather armored truck. Who else does that? These are things that are different. Or he fights (mammoth wrestler Big Show) on WWE. I have to say: He really knows how to play that role.

And there’s Dancing with the Stars. He was exposed to a national television audience of 20 million people, 20 million people. If 10 percent, 5 percent, even 2 percent become your fans or follow you, that’s something that wasn’t there before. He understands how to attract people, even people who aren’t necessarily big boxing fans. They’re attracted to the individual.

To a certain extent, Mayweather is just being Mayweather, he’s being himself. There’s no changing him. The fact is that he is also thinking outside the box. He goes the extra mile to sell a few more pay-per-view buys. Boxing is his passion, his love. He was born to fight. He was also born to be a promoter.

Whether you like him or hate him doesn’t matter. You either want him to win or get beat because he’s so charismatic. The important thing is to get a reaction from people. As long as they’re writing about you, good or bad, it promotes you. That’s his belief. He worked hard to promote our fight [Mayweather vs. De La Hoya] and the Ricky Hatton fight and those are the two biggest pay-per-view fights in history.

The fact he’s undefeated, the fact he doesn’t get hit, the fact he has a clean face, the fact he doesn’t have a broken nose … this all comes into play, too. People want to see that change, they want to see him get knocked out, to get cut. They want to see him in deep waters trying to swim to shore. People want to see him panic.

In his mind and his heart, he’s the best in the world. The fact he throws that out there irks people, ticks people off. So they want to see him lose. Then again, you have fans who respect him. The fans who respect the sport appreciate his boxing ability. They appreciate all the hard work he does. He knows how to capture both ends of the spectrum.

And I believe he’s just scratching the surface. There are more big fights he can be involved with, more big things he can do. I believe that, at age 32, this might just be the beginning for him. Some fighters start off fast when it comes to generating big money. Some start off slow. He might be one of those who is just getting started. Watch out world … here comes Floyd Mayweather.