Oscar De La Hoya plans to set up shop in a city where he was once the sport’s biggest draw.
The Hall of Fame former six-division champ and current chairman of Golden Boy Promotions plans to significantly invest his brand into local shows in Las Vegas. It was no coincidence that his team opened up 2024 with the Vergil Ortiz-Fredrick Lawson DAZN headliner at Virgin Hotels Las Vegas.
The hope from there is to make it a regular occurrence to bring Golden Boy-branded shows to town.
“Holly and I built this place to bring back boxing,” De La Hoya told BoxingScene.com and other reporters while hosting a media dinner from his $14 million mansion overlooking the Vegas strip. “We want to bring all the big shows that Golden Boy does to Vegas.”
De La Hoya confirmed that plans are in place to build a 2,500-3,000 seat Apex to host Golden Boy’s more intimate shows. Its construction is in progress and estimated that it is still at least a few months away from making the location Golden Boy’s official headquarters.
More than half of De La Hoya’s 45-career fights took place in Las Vegas, including 23 headliners and 22 world title fights (18-4 record). All but two of his Pay-Per-View headliners were held in the long-proclaimed fight capital of the world, with those 19 events amassing well north of 13,000,000 units sold and often in front of capacity crowds.
The chunk of Golden Boy’s events—especially since the pandemic—have been staged either in Golden Boy’s California home base or in Texas. They partnered with Premier Boxing Champions (PBC) last spring to present the Gervonta Davis-Ryan Garcia Showtime PPV event from T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas. The night produced the highest grossing boxing event of 2023, with more than $120,000,000 in live gate and PPV revenue.
Golden Boy’s first two major shows of 2024 take place outside of California. Saturday’s card was in Vegas, while the January 27 Jaime Munguia-John Ryder headlined show will land at Footprint Center, home to the NBA’s Phoenix Suns.
While there remain plans to run shows in California—the heart of Golden Boy’s fan base—the desire is to bring some of the magic surrounding De La Hoya’s own career to a fight town that can use the action on a regular basis.
“When I started looking into Vegas, I said let’s do something serious, something that’s going to be impactful,” insisted De La Hoya. “Not bring boxing back, but help it grow and keep the momentum going. Hell, we have Fight of the Year and runner-up as well. We just collaborated on the huge Pay-Per-View with Ryan Garcia and Tank Davis.
The possibilities this year are endless. [Hall of Fame former two-division champ and Golden Boy partner Bernard] Hopkins fought here many times. I fought here many times. We just got to bring the best fights back.”
Jake Donovan is a senior writer for BoxingScene.com. X (formerly Twitter): @JakeNDaBox