By Chris Williams: WBO super featherweight champion Mikey Garcia (33-0, 28 KO’s) wants to put on a little more weight before he faces Manny Pacquiao for a fight that he believes he’s capable of winning. Garcia said last Saturday night that he believes he can KO Pacquiao, and he’s very confident about his chances of making that happen. Mikey saw his friend Brandon Rios lose to Pacquiao, and he feels that wouldn’t happen to him if given the chance to fight the 34-year-old Pacquiao.
Mikey said to Ellie Sechbach “I’ve got to get a little bigger first, move to 140, and catch him somewhere around there. But why not?”
Mikey’s promoter Bob Arum is probably not going to let him fight Pacquiao because it might end badly for him. The fight would make Mikey much more popular, but I think Arum wouldn’t like it too much if Pacquiao were to blow Mikey out quickly. It would hurt Mikey’s career because he have to move back down to super featherweight or maybe move to lightweight and campaign off of a bad loss to Pacquiao.
Mikey will be fighting on January 25th on HBO. Arum of Top Rank wants him to face Juan Carlos Burgos, but HBO doesn’t seem to excited about that match-up, and prefer to see him face Yuriorkis Gamboa. However, Arum doesn’t like that fight for Mikey and he still wants Burgos to be the guy. It could be that HBO is turned off by the fact that Burgos and Roman “Rocky” Martinez fought to a 12 round draw earlier this year in January. With the ease that Mikey beat Roman Martinez, it’s not really an appealing thought to have Mikey fight the guy that was held to a draw against Martinez. That would be like a lateral move to the Martinez fight, and it would mean another mismatch shown by HBO. The Gamboa-Mikey fight is a lot more entertaining, but getting Arum to agree to it might be next to impossible.
Arum said to ESPN “He’s [Gamboa] not deserving of fighting Garcia, who has a great image.”
Gamboa (23-0, 16 KO’s) is unbeaten, a former WBA featherweight champion and former Olympic Gold medalist for Cuba. I don’t see why Arum doesn’t want to match Mikey up with Gamboa, unless there’s some worry for Arum that Mikey might lose the fight. Gamboa would destroy Burgos and Roman Martinez if he were to fight either of them. Why should HBO say yes to a fight between Burgos and Mikey when a much more competitive bout between Gamboa and Mikey.
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