Oscar De La Hoya says that Ryan Garcia does want to fight in September, and seems to acknowledge that Garcia does want to fight Conor Benn.
But De La Hoya insists that Garcia has a promotional contract with Golden Boy, and that if the fight is going to happen, it has to be on DAZN.
Garcia said fairly recently that he was going to fight Benn on September 12
; soon after, it was rumored to be a Zuffa Boxing event that would air on Paramount+.Since then, Golden Boy have issued a cease-and-desist to Zuffa,
and De La Hoya is standing his ground with longtime media rival Dana White and his new boxing venture.
“The problem that I have with Zuffa is everything they touch, whenever they get involved, it’s a big fuckin’ problem all the time,” De La Hoya said tonight on DAZN.
“Ryan Garcia has a promotional contract with Golden Boy, and Ryan is fighting on DAZN. Zuffa Boxing, all they do is get in the way and make things difficult. The bottom line is, yes, Ryan Garcia wants to fight on September 12th, but he’s gonna fight on DAZN.”
De La Hoya added: “If the opponent is gonna be Conor Benn, then so be it, but we all have to work together to make the fight happen. There’s promoters for a reason, there’s contracts for a reason, but again, when Zuffa gets involved, there’s always a big problem.”
The 27-year-old Garcia won the WBC welterweight title, his first world title, on February 21 by beating Mario Barrios. Benn (25-1, 14 KO) jumped to Zuffa and was allegedly paid $15 million to fight a washed-up Regis Prograis on Tyson Fury’s April 11 undercard at Tottenham Hotspur Stadium.
Garcia (25-2, 20 KO) and De La Hoya/Golden Boy seem to reach a new major dispute in their relationship every two or three years, and may be due for a new one, and this could be it. Each time in the past, Garcia has wound up staying with Golden Boy and extending his contract.
