By Scott Gilfoid: Unbeaten former two division world champion Mikey Garcia (34-0, 28 KOs) hasn’t fought in two years, but he’s already targeting WBO lightweight champion Terry Flanagan (30-0, 12 KOs) to go after his scalp and take his WBO title from him before moving up to light welterweight. Garcia, 28, isn’t ranked in the top 15 by the World Boxing Organization at the moment, which could make it kind of tough on him to get a crack at Flanagan’s title unless a fight can be worked out between them anyway.
Garcia will be fighting next month against Elio Rojas (24-2, 14 KOs) on July 30 on the undercard of the Leo Santa Cruz vs. Carl Frampton card at the Barclays Center in Brooklyn, New York. That should be a very wasy fight for Garcia, as Rojas is not a major talent in the sport.
Flanagan will be fighting next month on July 16 against 42-year-old former IBF super featherweight champion Mzonke Fana (38-9, 16 KOs) at the Ice Arena, in Cardiff, Wales.
“For this fight, we’ll be at somewhere around 135lbs, 136lbs. No higher than 140lbs,” said to Premier Boxing Champions. “I do want to fight for the title at 135 – maybe against Terry Flanagan, then fight for a title at 140. I want this one fight before going after a title. I’m ready.”
I think it prove to be difficult for Garcia to get Flanagan inside the ring. I mean, I don’t think Flanagan is just going to give Garcia a fight in a voluntary defense, especially if there’s a high chance that he’ll lose and lose badly. I can see Garcia having to wait until he’s the WBO mandatory challenger before Flanagan agrees to fight him. That would be a very dangerous fight for Flanagan to take on a big puncher like Garcia, because he punches too hard, and has better hand speed and boxing skills than Flanagan. If Flanagan wants a decent money fight, he would have a great opportunity if he agreed to defend his WBo title against Garcia. I just have serious doubts that he’ll ever agree to that.
Flanagan’s fight against Fana was originally scheduled for July 9 at the Manchester Arena in Manchester, UK. Fanagan and Fana were going to be fighting on the undercard of the Tyson Fury vs. Wladimir Klitschko rematch. However, after Fury suffered an ankle injury this month, it caused the fight to be postponed. As such, the Flanagan vs. Fana fight was moved to July 16 at the Ice Palace in Cardiff, Wales.
In the co-feature bout on the Flanagan-Fana card is WBA super bantamweight champion Guillermo Ridondeaux defending his WBA title against #12 WBA Jazza Dickens in a likely mismatch. Dickens is a decent fighter, but Rigondeaux is so far out of his class that it’s not even funny. This is a fight that shapes of to a terribly one-sided affair from start to finish.
“This is the next stage of my career and I’ll be remembered from what I do from this point forward as opposed to the past,” said Garcia.
Garcia shouldn’t waste his time if he can’t get a fight against Flanagan. He needs to move on by going up to 140 rather than chasing a fighter that may or may not be willing to fight him.