Maidana wants Danny Garcia fight

By Boxing News - 02/13/2015 - Comments

maidana52By Dan Ambrose: If WBA/WBC light welterweight champion Danny Garcia (29-0, 17 KOs) is able to get past his catch-weight fight against Lamont Peterson (33-2-1, 17 KOs) on April 11th, he might want to look in the direction of former WBA light welterweight champion Marcos Maidana (35-5, 31 KOs) for a fight in the summer, because that’s a fight that Maidana and his manager Sebastian Contursi are interested in making.

It’s a bout that’s in Garcia’s best interest to take unless he wants to continue to take catch-weight fights in order to slowly work his way into the division.

“We would like a fight against Danny Garcia in July or August,” said Contursi via espndeportes.espn.go.com.

Maidana, 31, is ranked #3 WBA, #3 WBC, #5 WBO, and he would be the ideal opponent for Garcia to face if he’s interested in taking on a well-known welterweight contender with a high a high ranking. It would be a great fight for Garcia to take in order to show that he belongs at welterweight, because if he can’t beat a guy like Maidana, then he’s just kidding himself in thinking he can fight in this weight class. However, it’s extremely doubtful that Garcia’s manager Al Haymon will let him anywhere near a guy like Maidana, at least not while Maidana is still more or less in his prime.

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When Garcia does move up to the 147 pound division, likely this year, he’s likely to be matched against guys that have little in the way of power. Garcia had big time problems in his fight against Lucas Matthysse in 2013, and he was forced to low blow, run and hold him all night long in order to squeak out a close 12 round decision.

If Garcia were to face Maidana and try the same tactics, he could find himself getting nailed with an equal amount of low blows, which would probably deter him from continuing that tactic.

Maidana punches with better power than Matthysse, and that would make it awfully difficult for Garcia to win a fight against him even if he were to throw low blows, hold and run like he did in the Matthysse fight.

It’s hard to imagine that Garcia will stay at 140 after his non-title fight against Peterson. This is Garcia’s second consecutive fight at a catch-weight of 143 pounds, and it’s hard to understand why he needed a second catch-weight fight in a row.

I can understand the 26-year-old Garcia fighting at one catch-weight to get acclimated to the welterweight division, but not two of them. If he continues to need catch-weight fights to get used to the welterweight division, then you have to wonder whether he’s mentally tough enough to fight in this weight class. He shouldn’t need all these catch-weights to get him ready for the division if he had the talent to fight at this weight.

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It’s going to be really tough for Garcia to find a place for himself at welterweight unless he’s going to be put on the sidelines until Floyd Mayweather Jr or Manny Pacquiao both retire. If that’s the plan, then it’s possible that Garcia could find a place in this weight class as long as he’s steered around fighters like Keith Thurman, Kell Book, Tim Bradley and Maidana.

Matthysse will soon be moving up to welterweight, and he’s another guy that Garcia will have to deal with. I don’t see Garcia being able to beat Matthysse a second time using the tricks he used to beat him the first time. It’s going to be a real problem if Garcia has to face him again.



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