Oscar Wants a Knockout and Roach Promises One

November 19, 2008 · Posted in Philippine Sports

During a conference call happened yesterday, Oscar De La Hoya talked about the need to win by knockout, claiming it would be a disaster if he didn’t. In light of those comments, Freddie Roach today had some things to say to his former student.

“Tell Oscar not to worry, the fight will end in a knockout,” Roach said through ace publicist Fred Sternburg yesterday from the Wild Card Boxing Club, the hotbed of Southern California fisticuffs.

“Mark my words he will flop too. Oscar can’t pull the trigger anymore. Losing all that weight doesn’t impress me,” said Roach in response to De La Hoya’s surprise appearance during his open workout in Big Bear, California, last week where he said he was under the welterweight limit of 147 lbs.
De La Hoya was in a jolly mood as he was holding court at close to 8,000 feet, boasting that he feels extremely good and couldn’t wait to get his hands on Pacquiao at the MGM Grand.
Roach said all that weight loss by De La Hoya will go down the drain.

“Twiggy is going to find out that looking the part is not equivalent to acting the part, a lesson Muhammad Ali learned when he fought Larry Holmes,” said Roach, referring to British Lesley ‘Twiggy’ Hornby, who, despite her skinny appearance, became the first supermodel in the late-1960s.

During a teleconference call on Monday from Big Bear, De La Hoya told the media that he will be “extremely disappointed” if the bout goes 12 rounds.
While he is not irked by Roach’s statements, De La Hoya is not amused either.

“Freddie Roach has made comments. I’m still going to say and put on the line is that I still respect him as a trainer and I still respect him as a person,” said De la Hoya, who will be fighting for the first time at welterweight (147 lbs) in almost seven years.

“So, I have nothing bad to say about Manny. And if Freddie Roach is going to say something bad about me, so be it. But I’m oozing with motivation, that’s for sure,” said De La Hoya, who is four inches taller than Pacquiao at 5-10 1/2.

On another note, in Roach’s blog this week for The Ring Magazine, Freddie talked about a sparring session that Oscar De La Hoya reportedly had with junior flyweight champion, Ivan Calderon.

“Calderon slapped Oscar around like it was unbelievable. I said between rounds one time, “Oscar, I want you to hit him one shot to show him who’s boss.” He couldn’t do it. I got mad at him. I told him the same thing another time; we used Calderon for a couple of days. I said, “Go ahead and hit that little mother.” Again, he couldn’t do it. Calderon was too quick and had a southpaw stance, like Manny does. That’s when I thought of Manny. I knew then it was a winnable fight.”

Roach had spent eight weeks with De La Hoya last year in San Juan, Puerto Rico, as the Golden Boy was revving up for Floyd Mayweather Jr. and it was right there that he claimed to have discovered that “he can’t pull the trigger anymore.”