It came to him at the most inopportune moment, like an uninvited guest who crashed his party. Between the eighth and ninth rounds of his fight with Manny Pacquiao, Oscar De La Hoya's corner men prevailed upon him:

"There's no reason to go on with this. This guy's just too fast for you," they told Oscar. "Do you agree? Are you okay with that?"

 In one of those tense and vacuous moments when time slows down, De La Hoya's facial expression conveyed emptiness, as if the joy of his spirit had been depleted. His response came with the slightest of nods and faintest word:

 "Yes," the Golden Boy grudgingly muttered, not only affirming his retirement, but confirming the authenticity of Pacquiao, a fighter many currently regard as the best in the world.

Rarely had an ending seemed so incongruous to a fighter so skilled. Too much of a beating for such an illustrious a career was this moment.

But something in the weight of this hour had not been in the air. De La Hoya's always-adoring crowd suddenly became so incensed that it seemed they might storm the front of the Staples Center and dismantle The Golden Boy's statue, like a crowd of Russians tearing down a symbol of Lenin, only to replace it with their latest demigod.

What lack of valor did they see? What was in their inability to discern his true condition?

The answer: They were boxing fans, and boxing fans have rules. An epitaph that reads "quit on the F-bombing stool" is the price De La Hoya would pay for declining to absorb any more punishment.

The sport reserves a place of honor for a fighter willing to eat any amount of punishment, a warrior who will "go out on his shield," But what wisdom lies in the capacity to absorb needless punches?

Oscar has said that a fighter always feels he has one more fight in him. On the night in question, though, he became the victim of flawed thinking, creating a dilemma only his corner men knew how to end.

De La Hoya was not executed so much as exposed as over-aged and unnaturally underweight, with communication between mind and body on the fade.

"You're right," he lamented to Freddie Roach, his former trainer and Pacquiao's chief second. "I just don't have it anymore."

"It" is that youthful speed a boxer needs to compete at the top, but a retirement hastened by the hand speed of Manny Pacquiao carries no shame.

De La Hoya should be celebrated, not ridiculed, for the intelligence of his decision. It makes no sense to hold an athlete in contempt for refusing to incur possible injury. Moreover, a man whom gambles with his well-being plays with his dignity as well.

So the coexistence of the boxer-slash-businessman comes to an end. Though Floyd Mayweather Jr. and others continue to call him out, De La Hoya insists he is finished with fighting, and dedicated instead to making the sport cleaner as CEO of Golden Boy Promotions.

Can Oscar give to boxing the badly needed cleansing it needs? Time will tell. It always does.

And what was it that came to Oscar that fateful night? Why, Father Time of course. He shows up at the most unwelcome moments.

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