News Flash: Oscar De La Hoya Can Beat Floyd Mayweather

The way people are talking about Saturday night's Fight of the Century, I was beginning to think literally no one believes Oscar De La Hoya can beat Floyd Mayweather. The betting public has made Mayweather the favorite, and he should probably be a bit more of a favorite than he is, given the way the bigger name (in this case, that's clearly De La Hoya) is always the pick of people who bet with their hearts instead of their heads.

But BoxingScene.com reminds me today that De La Hoya is not, in fact, a unanimous pick of the experts. In fact, of the 34 experts surveyed there, Mayweather wins the prediction vote by a score of just 21-13. I would have thought it would be more like 30-4 or so from the way the talking heads on TV (most of whom never watch boxing) are talking about this one.

The most persuasive case for De La Hoya comes from Ronnie Nathanielsz, who makes the point in De La Hoya's favor that hasn't been made enough in the run-up to this fight: De La Hoya is the bigger man.

Don't underestimate the advantage to De La Hoya of fighting at 154 pounds. I don't think anyone believes that at this stage in his career, De La Hoya is as good a pound-for-pound fighter as Mayweather, but pound-for-pound arguments don't mean anything once the fighters step into the ring. With Mayweather being forced to move up a weight class in order to get this fight, he's coming in at a disadvantage. That means betting on De La Hoya may be betting with more than just heart.