It appears the war of words between Golden Boy Promotions and Top Rank may be over...at least on Twitter. In the past few hours, Oscar De La Hoya and Bob Arum - well, at least it looked like Bob Arum, but his account was never verified by Twitter and Top Rank's official account says it's an imposter - exchanged a series of Tweets that look like an attempt to squash the ongoing animosity that's been building up between the two companies. It was just 5 days ago when Arum, or should we say the Fake Arum, first created the account, no doubt to respond to comments posted last week on Oscar De La Hoya's Twitter page, accusing him of "hurting the sport." It was Fake Arum who first reached out to De La Hoya on December 4, posting on his page, "Hello Oscar, I am here!"
Days would go by with no response from De La Hoya, as the fake Arum directed comments towards him [@OscarDeLaHoya], and even Golden Boy matchmaker Eric Gomez [@makeawar], like the following:
"@OscarDeLaHoya If Canelo can do 60million viewers in Mexico, I will match Manny with him at 142lbs."
"Let's match him with Manny, we can host in Dubai! This is what the sport needs! @makeawar"
"@OscarDeLaHoya @makeawar Hello, I am here"
Fake Arum even had time to send Floyd Mayweather a thank you, "Thanks, Floyd!" after retweeting a mystery birthday message from the undefeated pound-for-pound champion. Which would beg the question, if Arum and Mayweather were actually communicating via Twitter, does that mean a third round of negotiations would have begun for the fight we all really want? Probably not, but still, you never know...especially if you read too much into some of the other remarks Fake Arum posted, like the one 2 hours following his thanks to Floyd that read "Big news coming, stay tunned." But that's a different story.
It wasn't until hours ago when finally, De La Hoya would allegedly respond with his own birthday wishes for his former promoter, "Happy 79 th Birthday to my good friend @BobArum". Quickly Fake Arum would respond, "Thank you, Oscar!"
Shortly afterwards, another surprise message from Fake Arum to De La Hoya appeared that read, "@OscarDeLaHoya follow back so I can DM you! Let's get the contracts signed!"
Say what? Contracts? The plot thickens...or not!
De La Hoya, the real De La Hoya that is, would actually respond with more birthday wishes, but this time, it came with a sincere apology:
"Hello everyone, I am writing these words with great sincerity. Bob arum first of all happy b day and second I want to apologize for anything"
"That's I have said.let's somehow put this behind us and make fights let's show the world why boxing is the best sport"
Fake Arum would reply by retweeting De La Hoya's posts before a final message from De La Hoya would read:
"Bob arum from Oscar I am sorry now let's work together and take the world by storm,let's go on a strong run of fights."
Could it be? Did the power of Twitter just end the war between Top Rank and Golden Boy Promotions. Will the two companies work together in harmony to bring the fans the fights we really want to see. Surely this is some kind of holiday miracle that only the boxing gods could have bestowed upon us.
Don't get your hopes up. Although Bob Arum's Twitter profile was never verified and Top Rank's official Twitter account posted a message that read, "@bobarum on twitter is not the real Bob. Just FYI. Thanks everyone," there's always the possibility of the two sides getting into the holiday spirit and ending their trivial dispute for the good of the sport. Hey, at least De La Hoya is doing his part by issuing his apology after blasting Arum days ago. Of course, Tennessee Titans head coach Jeff Fisher would disagree and say "face-to-face is a man thing," but I guess a Twitter apology is better than nothing. Tis the season!
[ Follow Ben Thompson on Twitter @fighthype ]