Planning ahead

Dean Juipe

Thursday, June 21, 2001 | 10:34 a.m.

Self-assured as ever, Oscar De La Hoya comes into his Saturday fight with Javier Castillejo at the MGM Grand Garden promising his legion of fans an additional two years of dedication to the dangerous sport.

Unless, of course, he loses to Castillejo, in which case he'll fall back to a Plan B that includes music and movies.

"It's a decision I've made already," De La Hoya said, when asked Wednesday how he would react to a loss. "It would mean that's it, it's over. It would mean I have no business being in the ring."

Win or else. That's De La Hoya's motivation as he goes after a fourth world title, this time at 154 pounds and against the reigning World Boxing Council junior middleweight champion.

Bettors are convinced he'll win and maybe easily, as they have bet him from an opening line of minus 900 in the MGM sports book to the minus 1250 where he stands today. Castillejo opened at a plus 600 and is now a plus 850 underdog.

De La Hoya, 33-2 with 27 knockouts, is receiving $5 million for the pay-per-view bout.

Castillejo, 51-4 with 34 KOs, is getting $800,000.

"It's going to be a difficult fight, like all of my fights," De La Hoya said. "I'm not taking him lightly, not at all. I respect him and I think we'll have a very exciting fight."

Tickets, priced from $100 to $800, remain plentiful. It's $40 for the pay-per-view telecast, although it's supposedly blacked out in Southern Nevada.

"I'm young, I feel great and I'm still learning," De La Hoya said. "I've trained hard and trained smart. I'm ready."

At 28, he's looking to add to his repertoire of titles, having won legitimate belts at 135, 140 and 147 pounds. But he says he's just passing through the division and will quickly advance to 160.

"I can assure you I'll go to 160 very soon," he said, which could preclude him from fighting rival junior middleweight Fernando Vargas as some are hoping will happen yet this year. Vargas, who is fighting Shibata Flores Sept. 22 at Mandalay Bay, is joined by earlier De La Hoya conquerors Felix Trinidad and Shane Mosley as the most lucrative potential opponents currently out there for De La Hoya.

"I have to get revenge," he said of his two previous setbacks, "because Trinidad beat me and Mosley beat me. It's something that's going to happen in the future."

But he's going to do everything on his own conditions.

"They'll have to wait for me," De La Hoya said. "If they want to make money, they'll have to fight on my terms.

"Say I decide to fight Mosley. He's making under $2 million a fight now. Just because I'm Oscar De La Hoya, he's going to ask for $10-15 million and that's not going to happen.

"I'll offer him more than he's making, but it won't be a ridiculous amount."

While he says for the record that he's "focused and only thinking of one fight at a time," De La Hoya is obviously looking ahead and expects to handle Castillejo.

That confidence is the result of a solid training camp in which he went more than 100 rounds with a pair of fighters in the 170-pound range. He's also delighted with his latest trainer, Floyd Mayweather Sr.

"Training with Mayweather is a plus," De La Hoya said. "He's improved my speed and power.

"Our No. 1 concern was conditioning, because a lot of time I was fading out in the second half of a fight. Mayweather has me running with weights in my hands for the first mile; running more miles than I was used to; and running with heavy boots on my feet."

Mayweather says De La Hoya "is in good shape now. He's much stronger than he was at previous weights."

This accent on conditioning came about after De La Hoya said he realized he hadn't been giving his all in previous years.

"I feel that I lost a lot of time ... not focusing on boxing," he said. "I need a couple of years to make my mark and show what I'm all about. Two more years -- that's all I'm going to fight -- and I want to be the best I can be during that time."