(Photo credit: Ed Diller/Dibella Entertainment) By Gerarddo Granados: There is no doubt that the casual fans will buy anything they are told to be a good competitive bout, but are boxing purists and hard core fans up to believe that Danny Garcia is as good as he believes he is? A friend of mine told me about a video in which Garcia stated that he didn’t care about what people think and asked what other young boxer had faced in his last 10 at least 8 fights against world or former champions; I saw the video but I think that a belt holder cannot be compared to the division champion and what Garcia states will allow him to look impressive in the eyes of casual fans but it can’t last forever.
On his last ten outings Garcia faced: Lamont Peterson former WBA-IBF super lightweight won a highly controversial decision, Rod Salka terrible mismatch, light hitting Mauricio Herrera won a controversial decision, Lucas Matthysse won a clear UD, past prime former champion Zab Judah won by unanimous decision, past prime former champion Erik Morales won by brutal KO4, prime former WBA-IBF light welter champion Amir Khan won by KO4, past prime Erik Morales won by a decision, former WBO light welter belt holder Kendall Holt won by SD, and former WBA-IBF-WBO lightweight champion Nate Campbell by UD but Nate previous this bout had lost his last two.
Danny avoided his mandatory challenger at 140 Viktor Postol and it has been a long time since he was praised by fight fans for an impressive victory.
Light hitting Paul Malignaggi retired after he was knocked out by Shawn Porter and has been out of the ring for a year and a half. The Magic Man has never been a great boxer and his defensive skills have never been on the elite level, also have lost against most of the top fighters he has faced in the past: by UD to Miguel Cotto, by TKO11 to Ricky Hatton, by UD to Juan Diaz, by TKO11 to Amir Khan, by SD to Adrien Broner and by TKO4 to Shawn Porter.
Is there a better opponent to move up to 147? After all Paul is a retired former belt holder who now works as a TV analyst. I´ll wait until Garcia defeats a top ten welter before measure his potential at this weight division.
Young Oscar de la Hoya also faced 8 out of 10, he also defeated them leaving no doubt about the winner; but he also defeated past prime former champions and belt holders while beating couple of world champions in the process. Oscar matchmaking was smart always having the size edge, but is it odd that not many fight fans have him on a top ten all-time greatest list.
Malignaggi has a name but I don’t think he represent a legit threat for Garcia, if Danny fails to impress and knock him out it would be clear he could struggle against top welters; but if Garcia does an easy job of Paul it won’t be a surprise after what Shawn Porter did.
Do the readers know if Malignaggi is even ranked at the top 15 by at least one major boxing organization? He is not. This is what a greedy promoter could call smart matchmaking but to me it is not a real challenge.
But what about the reader, do you agree?
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