De La Hoya Wants Arum to Give Back Gold Medal

LAS VEGAS — Oscar De La Hoya is making a public appeal to get his gold medal back.

The appeal is directed at his former promoter, Bob Arum, from whom De La Hoya split last year in an ugly legal battle.

This week, as he prepared for his first appearance in the ring in nine months tonight against Arturo Gatti at the MGM Grand Garden Arena, De La Hoya said the gold medal still occupies his thoughts.

In happier times, when the Arum-De La Hoya team was churning out record revenues for non-heavyweight bouts, De La Hoya’s Olympic gold medal was wheeled into a birthday party for Arum in a Reno hotel and presented to the promoter.

The medal has significant emotional meaning for De La Hoya. Besides symbolizing his memorable victory in the 1992 Barcelona Games, which stamped him as “the Golden Boy” and launched him into his professional career, it was a prize he vowed he would win to honor his mother, who died of cancer before seeing him reach his goal.

“I would love to have it back,” De La Hoya said. “I should have it back. We had an agreement that when [Arum] was no longer my promoter, he would give it back. I expect him to do that. He is not my promoter. Why not give it back?”

Replied Arum, who has not spoken to De La Hoya since their acrimonious breakup, “Since when did the writers become employees of Oscar to do his dirty work? Tell him to call me and I’ll give him back his medal.”

Don’t wait by the phone, Bob.

STINGING JABS

It is one thing to fire people you believe are not doing their jobs.

It is quite another to keep firing away on them after their departures.

De La Hoya has cut his ties to his long-time trainer, Robert Alcazar, to another trainer, Emanuel Steward, and to Arum, but has continued to pepper them with verbal jabs, going out of his way to minimize their roles in his life.

Of his trainers, De La Hoya said, “Basically, I did everything on my own, with my own natural talent. Robert reached his limits of what he could teach me. And really, Manny didn’t teach me anything.”

Of Arum, De La Hoya said, “They brought in trainers like Manny Steward and Gil Clancy, they being Arum, and, because I was not in control, I was overruled.”

Comment: Jerry Perenchio has replaced Arum as promoter. One of the first people Perenchio hired was Clancy. Clancy is not working as a trainer in De La Hoya’s camp, but he is around this week in a capacity yet to be clearly defined.

De La Hoya claimed that Arum never promoted his fights until the week of the event.

He said, “I would have fellow Hispanics coming up to me, asking, ‘When are you going to fight?’ And that would be the day of the fight.”

Comment: De La Hoya has apparently forgotten the press tours Arum staged in the weeks and months before blockbuster events, including the 1996 marathon cross-country tour with De La Hoya and Julio Cesar Chavez, each fighter on his own plane.

De La Hoya also said a January ruling by a federal judge that his contract with Arum was null and void could serve as an important precedent.

“You as a fighter are doing all the work,” De La Hoya said. “Why should you be tied down to one promoter? That’s not fair to the fighters. They should be able to call their own shots. Hopefully, my win over Bob Arum will show other fighters that they can do it too.”

Comment: Already on a legal hot streak, maybe De La Hoya should appeal to the judge to get him back his medal.

OBVIOUS JAB

Among those attending Friday’s weigh-in, at which De La Hoya stepped on the scales at 147 pounds, Gatti at 146, was O.J. Simpson, who said he is a big De La Hoya fan.

Just what boxing needs for its already battered image.

SHARP JAB

De La Hoya, if he wins tonight as expected, plans to fight World Boxing Council 154-pound champion Javier Castillejo of Spain June 9.

After that, De La Hoya hopes to have his next big blockbuster pay-per-view show in September.

Against whom?

De La Hoya said he would like to take on the two men who beat him in the order he lost, apparently meaning first Felix Trinidad, then Shane Mosley.

Responded Trinidad’s father, through a translator, “Oscar should see a psychiatrist. He says he wants to fight a fighter like Tito [Felix Jr.], but he is not on Tito’s level. . . . If he wants to fight Tito, let him fight Mosley first.”

QUICK JABS

Also on tonight’s De La Hoya-Gatti card will be an International Boxing Federation cruiserweight title fight between Vassiliy Jirov (27-0, 25) and Terry McGroom (19-2-2, 10). In a 10-round welterweight match, perennial contender Oba Carr (52-3-1, 31) takes on Rafael Pineda (34-3, 28). And there’ll be a pair of preliminary bouts involving 2000 Olympians. Junior-bantamweight Jose Navarro (1-0), managed by De La Hoya, faces Antonio Perez (5-4-1, 2) in a six-rounder, and junior-welterweight Ricardo Williams (1-0, 1) battles Joey Bullock (4-0, 1) in a four-round match.

WBC super-featherweight champion Floyd Mayweather (25-0, 19) will defend his title May 26 in Van Andel Arena in Grand Rapids, Mich., against Carlos Hernandez (33-2-1, 21) of Bellflower.

Thursday night’s card at the Arrowhead Pond in Anaheim will be headlined by super-flyweight Carlos Madrigal (14-2, 9), going against Pedro Pena (18-2, 10) in a 10-round match. First bell is at 7:30. . . . Also Thursday night at the Hollywood Park Casino in Inglewood, heavyweight Cliff Couser (20-6-2, 9), a Mike Tyson look-alike, will take on A.J. Moore (8-19-2, 6) in a 10-round match. Couser may look like Tyson, but he doesn’t fight like him. However, considering Moore’s record, how good does Couser have to be? First bell is at 7:30.

Friday, boxing debuts at a new fight site in the San Fernando Valley, the Odyssey restaurant in Granada Hills. The main event features lightweights Rolando Reyes (7-1-1, 4) and Raimundo Almeida (8-2, 5) in an eight-round match. First bell is at 7:30.