Georges St-Pierre missed out on huge boxing match because of Dana White, was offered Khabib Nurmagomedov instead

Despite his hopes for a lucrative boxing match with Oscar De La Hoya in 2021, former UFC welterweight champion Georges St-Pierre’s plans were thwarted by UFC president Dana White.

Despite retiring from MMA in 2019, St-Pierre has consistently expressed a desire to remain active. Although a scheduled jiu-jitsu match against Nick Diaz was cancelled due to injury last year, the renowned Canadian athlete has been considering a potential boxing match with De La Hoya.

In 2021, De La Hoya joined Triller Fight Club, but St-Pierre’s prior commitments to the UFC prevented him from accepting the offer.

In the Pound 4 Pound Podcast, St-Pierre expressed his desire to face De La Hoya, but acknowledged that Dana White rejected the offer due to his long-standing hostility towards the current boxing promoter.

According to St-Pierre:

“It didn’t happen because Dana White told me no. Dana White hates Oscar De La Hoya and my contract with [UFC] after you retire you still have a few years, depending on the contract. but my contract was, the way it’s made is, I still [had] ties with UFC for up to… I can’t remember the number of years exactly… but I still had ties with UFC and Dana.”

Despite the De La Hoya fight not happening, White allegedly proposed a match between St-Pierre and Khabib Nurmagomedov as a substitute. Unfortunately, since both fighters had retired, the match was never able to materialize.

“And then he [White] called me after, he said he wanted me to fight Khabib, but Khaib already retired and I already retired so…”[38:12]

Georges St-Pierre reflects on potential advantages in boxing match against Oscar De La Hoya

Georges St-Pierre discussed his opinions on the theoretical boxing match against Oscar De La Hoya, if it were to actually happen.

During their joint appearance on the Pound 4 Pound Podcast, ‘Rush’ paid tribute to De La Hoya’s illustrious boxing career and acknowledged that he would not have been able to defeat a prime ‘Golden Boy’. However, St-Pierre believes that their age gap would have played a major role if the match had taken place in 2021.

According to him:

“The Oscar De La Hoya [fight], it was not an MMA fight obviously. It was boxing, but it was boxing with bigger gloves, like 16-ounce, sparring gloves. And you know, Oscar is almost 10 years older than me. I don’t have the audacity of saying that I’m a better boxer than Oscar in his prime. No way, Oscar was one of the best of all time.”

St-Pierre stated:

“Oscar in his prime would have beat me in boxing like easily. But because I’m younger than him and I think I have less mileage than he does, I think it would made a fair fight and I think I would have beat him in boxing.”[37:05]

Below you can find the comments made by Georges St-Pierre: