De La Hoya Says He Skipped His Own Co-Promotion Because He Was Going to Be “Set Up”

Oscar De La Hoya has explained why he did not attend Ryan Garcia vs. Conor Benn last month, a fight his own company co-promoted, and his answer is the second allegation this week from a major promoter about being pushed out of an event involving his own fighter.

“I wasn’t going to show up to be embarrassed,” De La Hoya told Fight Hub TV. “It was a Zuffa f***ing event. A ‘Zuffa event,’ a ‘Turki event.’ I was not going to show up and be embarrassed, because that’s exactly what they were going to do to me. I was not going to do that. So I made the wise decision to not go.”

Garcia stopped Benn in the second round at T-Mobile Arena in September, in a bout co-promoted by Golden Boy and Zuffa Boxing with The Ring.

“Oh yeah, so much s*** happened in those dealings, in those contracts, but let’s just say I’m glad I didn’t go because I was going to be set up,” De La Hoya said.

His exhibit is Teofimo Lopez, who was not allowed into the ring for a face-off with Garcia after the fight. That is De La Hoya’s reading of what was waiting for him. Dana White’s stated reason at the time was operational, that Zuffa was not putting unscheduled fighters in the ring.

The credential question is disputed too. Dan Rafael reported during fight week that Zuffa had denied De La Hoya a credential. White said that was not the case, that he would have called and told him not to come if it had been, and that he did not know why De La Hoya stayed away. Later reporting indicated a ticket existed, though not in the seat his co-promoter status would ordinarily carry.

Garcia said afterwards he was disappointed, and that he had wanted De La Hoya on his ring walk. Golden Boy’s Jane Murcia said Garcia’s team withdrew that invitation on the morning of the fight, and Garcia reposted her account as accurate.

Then came the line that suggests this is not finished: “I haven’t even started, let’s put it that way.”

It lands in a week where Eddie Hearn has been making a structurally similar argument about Fury vs. Joshua. Hearn says Joshua’s contract bars Zuffa Boxing and TKO from promotional involvement, says Sela told him in writing that White cannot produce the broadcast, and says TKO approached a member of Joshua’s team directly.

“That’s why they offered AJ a load of money to let them do it,” Hearn said on The Ariel Helwani Show. “It also involved the fight in America. He had to go to some WWE events. This was someone who came round the back and approached a member of AJ’s team with a very clear written proposal.”

Hearn has put the figure at around $10 million. The document is not public, and TKO, Zuffa Boxing and White have not responded to the claim.

Frank Warren is the counterexample, and he matters precisely because he is one.

In February, The Telegraph reported that Queensberry had sent letters before action to Sela and TKO, alleging breach of contract over the formation of Zuffa Boxing and seeking up to $1 billion in lost income, with Warren prepared to take the case to the High Court if there were no resolution. A Sela spokesperson called the claims unfounded. Nothing has been reported since about where the matter stands.

In May, Warren told Fight Hub TV that Fury’s contract barred Zuffa from promoting the fight, and dismissed White’s claim to be running it.

“Dana and Nick Khan, they went and done the deal with Netflix. So they have to be a part of it,” Warren told Playbook Boxing. “For me, I have no problem whatsoever. Never had a problem.” He has also said that he and Sela locked in Cardiff.

That is not the position he held in February, or in May.

So the same counterparty has produced a threatened billion-dollar claim, a contractual standoff, a promoter who stayed home from his own event, and a working partnership on the biggest fight of the year, depending on who is describing it and when.

None of this is a legal finding. De La Hoya and Hearn are interested parties describing their own grievances, and nobody at TKO or Zuffa has answered either account.

What makes the De La Hoya version worth noting is where he has already made the broader argument. He was the only promoter to testify against the Muhammad Ali American Boxing Revival Act at the Senate Commerce Committee hearing on April 22, opposing the Unified Boxing Organization model in person while Nick Khan made TKO’s case for it in 13 pages of written testimony.

Khan addressed the concentration question directly in that submission. “Multiple UBOs can exist. Promoters including Golden Boy, Top Rank, and MVPW could each form a UBO,” he wrote. “If TKO becomes the only UBO, that is because no one else built one. The bill does not prevent competition. It enables it.”

Five months later, Golden Boy’s biggest star fought on a Zuffa card and Golden Boy’s founder says he stayed away rather than be set up.

Whether that is evidence of the concentration critics warned about, or two promoters losing arguments they chose to have in public, is something the next twelve months will settle rather than this week.