Oscar De La Hoya vs. Félix Trinidad

The Fight of the Millennium

Date	September 18, 1999
Venue	Mandalay Bay Events Center, Paradise, Nevada, U.S.
Title(s) on the line	WBC and IBF welterweight titles
Tale of the tape
Boxer Oscar De La Hoya Félix Trinidad Nickname "The Golden Boy" "Tito" Hometown East Los Angeles, California, U.S. Cupey Alto, San Juan, Puerto Rico Purse $21,000,000 $8,500,000 Pre-fight record 31–0 (25 KO) 35–0 (30 KO) Age 26 years, 7 months 26 years, 8 months Height 5 ft 10+1⁄2 in (179 cm) 5 ft 11 in (180 cm) Weight 147 lb (67 kg) 147 lb (67 kg) Style Orthodox Orthodox Recognition WBC Welterweight Champion The Ring pound-for-pound No. 1 ranked fighter 4-division world champion IBF Welterweight Champion The Ring pound-for-pound No. 4 ranked fighter
Result
Trinidad wins via 12–round majority decision (114–114, 115–114, 115–113)

Oscar De La Hoya vs. Félix Trinidad, billed as The Fight of the Millennium, was a boxing match held at the Mandalay Bay Events Center on the Las Vegas Strip on September 18, 1999, to unify the WBC and IBF welterweight championships.

After twelve tensely fought rounds, Trinidad was declared the winner by a majority decision.

Background

Planned by promoters Bob Arum and Don King, it pitted WBC world champion Oscar De La Hoya, a Mexican American, Los Angeles native, versus Puerto Rican IBF world champion Félix Trinidad. It was the last of the so-called superfights of the 20th century.

The fight

After twelve tensely fought rounds, Trinidad was declared the winner by a majority decision.

De La Hoya and Trinidad were content to box from the outside most of the fight, with De La Hoya using his boxing skills and Trinidad looking for openings in De La Hoya's guard. De La Hoya injured one of Trinidad's eyes along the process, and he built a lead that he apparently felt, after nine rounds, secured him the win on points. In fact, at the time, he was leading, but only by 87–84 and 86–85 on two score cards while the third card was tied at 86–86.

De La Hoya boxed in circles from rounds ten to twelve, while Trinidad upped his offensive output. This became a crucial matter because while De La Hoya backpedalled, Trinidad accumulated points on the scorecards and De La Hoya was given only one round by one of the three scoring judges the rest of the way. Trinidad out-punched De la Hoya by a margin of 64 to 33 during those three remaining rounds.

Trinidad was afterwards declared winner by margins of 115–113 on one card and 115–114 on the second, the third one being a 114–114 draw, thus Trinidad winning by a 12 rounds majority decision.

Aftermath

The bout set the pay-per-view record for a non-heavyweight fight with 1.4 million ($70 million) buys on HBO and $12.9 million in ticket sales, until it was broken by De La Hoya-Mayweather on May 5, 2007. It set the record 2.4 million buys, the most in boxing history until that was surpassed by Mayweather-Pacquiao in 2015 with the record of 4.4 million buys.

In 2014, both boxers were inducted into the International Boxing Hall of Fame.

Undercard

Confirmed bouts:

Broadcasting

Country	Broadcaster
United States	HBO

See also

• Errol Spence Jr. vs. Shawn Porter