The Golden Boy, the golden era and the golden future. What keeps Oscar De La Hoya going? The man is a multi millionaire, a gold medalist, a world champion in six weight classes, a nine-time world champion, a promoter, a Grammy Award winning singer and even though he has a hot looking wife, Millie Corretjer, he could get any woman he wants without asking. What keeps this man going? Where does he get his drive from when it comes to getting back into the ring? Usually when someone achieves even half of that they want they get content and start to take things easy and let their motivation slide into the realm of not really caring. Oscar seems to rise to the championship level every time.

He was given the name Golden Boy after winning the gold medal in the 1992 Olympics. Oscar's amateur record is a stellar one: 223-5 with 163 knockouts. That is one hell of a record, probably one of the best in amateur boxing. During his Olympic run Oscar's mother was battling breast cancer and eventually died. With all that going in his life, Oscar dug down deep in his heart and will and brought home the gold medal. That heartfelt moment was embraced by all boxing fans and crossover fans to boxing once it was known publicly. Soon after coming back from Barcelona, Oscar was pursued by all the promoters in the fight game, eventually signing with Bob Arum and Top Rank.

As a professional De La Hoya was on the fast track to becoming a champion. Oscar fought for his first world title at the Super Lightweight Division for the WBO belt against Jimmi Bredhal who was 16-0 with 5 knockouts at the time. This was Oscar's 12th professional bout and it took place at the Olympic auditorium in Los Angeles. De La Hoya dominated the fight from the opening bell and ran Jimmi into the ground, prompting the ref to stop the fight in the tenth round, giving Oscar his first world title. That was one down with four more weight classes to go.

Oscar soon stepped up in weight and fought Jorge Paez at lightweight, taking the vacant title, winning by 2nd round knockout. Then Oscar lifted the IBF title off a veteran champion Rafael Ruelas, which was at the time supposed to be Oscar's toughest fight. He won by knockout in the second round, dropping Ruelas twice. This was De La Hoya's 18th fight, not to mention at this point in Oscar's career he has been fighting guys that had way more professional experience. Basically Oscar was just a kid compared to the guys he was fighting and he was beating them all, very decisively too. At this point Oscar was beating guys that had twice as many fights as him and he was beating them like it was the other way around.

The next big fight for De La Hoya was fighting ring legend and Mexican legend Julio Cesar Chavez at the Light Welterweight division. This fight was Chavez's 100th professional bout and De La Hoya was expected to be in for a long night. That was far from the case; De La Hoya took the fight to Chavez and busted him up real bad. The fight was stopped due to cuts and De La Hoya got the win over the living legend. Of course Chavez was bitter after getting beat so bad and complained that the fight was stopped, but it would've only gotten worse for Chavez. This was one of the biggest moments in Oscar's career. At this point in Oscars' career he is being hounded be damn near every female on the planet, which is enough to put a dent into any man's mindset when it comes to staying focused. Not for Oscar.

De La Hoya, after beating Chavez, was on top of his game. His fame went through the roof and no one knew when his train was going to stop. Oscar was still fighting top contenders and former champions and beating them with ease. So his next step was to move up in weight and fight the Welterweight Champion, Pernell Whitaker. The bout was fought in Las Vegas at the Thomas and Mack Center. A sold out crowd watch De La Hoya win the WBC Welterweight title from Whitaker, capturing another title in his fourth weight class. This was truly a remarkable feat, although many thought that the fight could've gone the other way and Whitaker received the short end of the stick. In this fight Oscar found himself tasting a bit of the canvas, nothing big as Oscar wasn't hurt at all.

The first loss in De La Hoya's career was a highly disputed loss to Felix Trinidad back in 1999 at the Mandalay Bay in Las Vegas. Oscar put on a boxing lesson and totally seemed to have the fight in the bag. Oscar made it look like Trinidad wasn't even on his level. He boxed beautifully. Using his jab, moving in and out, using angles, everything you would want your fighter to do if you were his trainer. Oscar has always been good when it comes to taking advice fro his trainers, but this time it seemed to have bit him in the ass because listening to them cost him the fight. His trainer at the time told Oscar to stay away and that the fight was his. Well, Oscar took that advice a little too literal because to many it looked like he was running away and not fighting at all. The judges saw it that way and Oscar was dealt his first loss. Which, to this day, is still argued by many, but I honestly think that Oscar won that fight. He won every round up till the eighth when he started to hop on his bicycle. So if he won seven rounds out of 10 doesn't that make him the winner? I think so, but then again it is boxing and everyone knows boxing isn't on the up and up sometimes.

After suffering his first loss, De La Hoya won his next fight with Derrell Coley. Thinking that he was back to his winning ways De La Hoya took on another Southern California rising star in Shane Mosley. De La Hoya had winning on his mind for this fight and he knew that Mosley was a tough competitor. He tried to feel out Mosley in the first round but Mosley didn't want to do any feeling out. He got right to business and took the fight to De La Hoya, making the fight an exciting one from beginning to end. Both combatants fought as they were supposed too, as skilled warriors. There was tons of give and take but the end result had Mosley winning by split decision. Another setback for De La Hoya.

People are now starting to doubt if Oscar has any more desire to fight. People are thinking he's too rich to be a fighter with hunger. He's been champion for a long time now and he's lost his drive. People are saying that his personal life is too demanding for boxing. So what does Oscar do when facing these doubts? He fights tough boy Arturo Gatti. Gatti is out of his league as far as boxing skills, but in a league of his own when it comes to heart and desire. Sad to say for Gatti, De La Hoya completely outclassed, out powered and out fought Gatti stopping him in the fifth round. This was good for De La Hoya in the eye of the public, but every boxing fanatic and expert knew that it wasn't a major test for De La Hoya.

So to take it a step further De La Hoya wants another belt in another weight class. This time stepping up into the Junior Middleweight Division taking on Javier Castillejo the WBC champ. The fight wasn't anything to really write home about; Castillejo doesn't really have the style to make real exciting fights. This fight was the bout that led to the grudge match with Fernando Vargas.

Fernando Vargas and Oscar De La Hoya have had a rivalry going on behind the scenes for a long time running. A lot of it stemmed from a hometown rivalry. Oscar being from East L.A. and Vargas being from Oxnard, California, which is a little bit north of L.A. That and Oscar has fame and Vargas was feeling like he was living under Oscar's shadow.

The pre-fight hype was all about Vargas calling out De La Hoya, saying he wasn't a real Mexican, that he wasn't tough and that he was just a pretty boy with a padded record. This had De La Hoya fuming and he was ready to get to work. In the first round Vargas got on De La Hoya and got hot and heavy. Vargas pressed the action and almost had De La Hoya on the canvas, but Oscar's skill and guile kept him on his feet to finish the round without going to the ground. Oscar started to step it up a bit and won the next couple of rounds, using his boxing skills -- staying in the middle of the ring and off the ropes, not getting into any exchanges. Basically he was reverting back to his old style.

His new trainer Floyd Mayweather Sr. is big on defense and wanted De La Hoya to showcase his defense more when Vargas was trying to tee off. The only thing is, De La Hoya was doing better boxing and moving instead of trying to do the shoulder roll. De La Hoya is a naturally gifted fighter and didn't need to implement the shoulder roll, but as he has done in the past, he listens well to his trainers, so he did. The next thing you see is Vargas starting to land more and more shots, making the fight more of an even battle.

Rolling your shoulder as a fighter only works for guys who fight on their natural talents alone -- fighters like Roy Jones Jr. and Floyd Mayweather Jr. It's more of a instinct-style defense which has been adapted by others and some fighters infuse it into their style. Most of the fighters that take on the shoulder roll defense style end up eating a lot of punches that they'd normally slip had they stuck to their regular defensive style. With all that being said, everyone saw Oscar eating more shots than usual and it added to the suspense of the fight.

The fight between De La Hoya and Vargas was all that it was hyped up to be -- it had the drama and it had two gladiators giving it their all inside the ring. Both fighters fought as if their world depended on it, but as the fight wore on you could see De La Hoya starting to pull away a bit. He was landing more, moving better, and Vargas started to slow down his punch output. Then, right at the end of the 10th round, De La Hoya rocked Vargas, signifying the end was coming soon. Larry Merchant was announcing the fight on HBO and started to criticize De La Hoya for not jumping on Vargas, and as soon as he took a deep breathe to give a long winded diatribe on how De La Hoya let an opportunity slip by, De La Hoya right at that moment landed a huge left hook and dropped Vargas. Not only did he drop Vargas, he hurt him bad. Vargas got up and beat the count but was then pummeled until the referee was forced to stop the fight. And thank you, De La Hoya, for doing so, by saving us from hearing anymore of Merchant's unnecessary drunken rants.

This victory had to be one of the most satisfying wins in De La Hoya's career, stopping someone who had disrespected him and been a pain in his ass for some time. After the bout De La Hoya had another victory when Vargas failed his drug test and tested for steroids. Oscar wasn't bent out of shape about Vargas taking steroids and putting his life at risk. He looked at it and told the press "he can't even beat me when he cheats".

All this going on in Oscar's life and yet he still finds it in himself to rise to the occasion and still win. Forget about winning, he still rises up to the challenge. Most of us in the world would have the attitude of being content and wouldn't even think of going any further and retire. Not De La Hoya, he wants to avenge his loss against Mosley. Trinidad has retired so going after him isn't in the cards. Mosley on the other hand was looking to get his name back into the public's mind after losing to Vernon Forrest twice. So De La Hoya and Mosley got everything settled and set up a fight in Las Vegas again.

This bout was different from their first bout. They have had some difficulties in and out of the ring; both are bigger and older now, so the elements have changed. De La Hoya looked sharp in his second bout with Mosley. Oscar out hustled Mosley and moved around the ring like he used to, the only difference was his power. There wasn't any -- it seemed his punches had nothing on them at all. Mosley, on the other hand, had tons of pop in his punches. You could hear the punches when he landed all the way from the nosebleed section. De La Hoya started to slow down and Mosley started to take all those power shots to the body, further making it tough on De La Hoya to move around. Being at the fight live, I thought that Mosley won as he landed the harder shots and didn't change his game plan at all in the fight. The judges saw it that way too, but after going home and watching it on TV without the volume off, I had Oscar winning by two rounds. Another flip of the coin decision, it just happened to be tails for De La Hoya.

Oscar, still not satisfied, decides to try his skills at the Middleweight division. He set up a fight with Felix Sturm at the MGM in Las Vegas. The bout was for the WBO Middleweight belt that Sturm was the holder of. Winning this fight would make De La Hoya a six-time world champion and set up a fight with then Middleweight kingpin Bernard Hopkins. What does Oscar do in this fight? He comes in fat, the fattest he's ever been, and the most out of shape we have ever seen him in the ring. Sturm, sensing this, jumps on De La Hoya and sticks a wicked jab in his face all night long. The end result was Oscar getting a controversial win over Sturm. He got a win over a guy named Felix, just not Felix Trinidad.

Oscar vowed to never be in that kind of shape again coming into a fight, and he didn't after that. He came in real fighting shape against Bernard Hopkins. Oscar came into the fight fit with no flab and was ready to get busy. He started out being aggressive, which threw everyone off; everyone was thinking that he would've been on the run being in there with such a bigger guy. De La Hoya stood right in front of Hopkins and was firing off combos. He almost made it look easy, but slowly you could see the power and game plan of Hopkins starting to appear. De La Hoya was starting to get hit with straight right hands from Hopkins and started to slow down more. The next thing you know De La Hoya was being bullied in the ring, Hopkins started to sit down on his punches and was really giving Oscar a pelting to the body.

In the ninth round De La Hoya met the pain of a perfectly-placed body shot and went down. It was the first time in De La Hoya's career when he suffered a knockout loss, and it was the first time he was truly hurt for the in the ring. Many said that it was the weight, and I'm sure it was, but it was also a combination of things. The weight, the time in his career and most of all he was fighting the toughest guy he has ever faced, who is known for ruining fighters' careers. They don't call him the Executioner for nothing.

So now De La Hoya has moved back down to Junior Middleweight and is looking to fight Ricardo Mayorga, the WBC Junior Middleweight champion. Again, the question gets raised another time. What keeps him going? What keeps him motivated? Where does his drive come from? Who knows really? But in this fight with Mayorga he has a ton of motivation to fuel his fire.

Mayorga has been nothing but disrespectful to Oscar since the beginning of promoting the fight. Calling Oscar a pussy, making derogatory statements about his wife, saying he took a dive against Hopkins. Mayorga said that De La Hoya sang like a homo, and that he wants to stop De La Hoya's heart with a punch. Mayorga even went so far as to slap Oscar in the back of the head in one of the press conferences. When Oscar gets mad he gets ruthless in the ring. The fight with Mayorga is going to be a classic grudge match. It seems that every time Mayorga hypes a fight, it's done in this manner, but I think this time he might have crossed the line and has really gotten under Oscar's skin. Oscar has said that he has never been in a street fight and it's the exact opposite with Mayorga. Mayorga has fought more than his share of street fights. Fighting like he's in the streets is the style Mayorga brings to the ring. This is the kind of fight where we see a boxer verses a fighter. Who is going to come out on top? And what keeps De La Hoya going at this level of competition? I guess we'll have to see on May 6 at the MGM Grand in Las Vegas.