By Dan Ambrose: WBA/WBC light welterweight champion Danny Garcia (30-0, 17 KOs) will be fighting former two division world champion Paulie Malignaggi (33-6, 7 KOs) on August 1st on ESPN on Premier Boxing Champions at the Barclays Center in Brooklyn, New York, according to Dan Rafael of ESPN.
This isn’t the fight that a lot of boxing fans were hoping to see from the 27-year-old Garcia. Fans want to see Garcia step up to the full weight for the welterweight division and face someone of quality like Marcos Maidana, Kell Brook, Floyd Mayweather Jr. or Keith Thurman. But Garcia appears to have some concerns about making the step up against the best fighters, perhaps due to his poor showing in his last fight against Lamont Peterson last April.
Garcia won the fight by a 12 round majority decision, but he caved in completely in the last six rounds and took a beating. Garcia had dominated most of the first six rounds of action based on Peterson’s cautious game plan, but once Peterson started attacking Garcia in the second half, it was all Peterson.
“Aug. 1 PBC on ESPN main event is done: @DannySwift vs. @PaulMalignaggi. Site is @barclayscenter. #boxing,” Dan Rafael said on his Twitter.
You have to see this fight as little more than a money fight for Danny Garcia. The 34-year-old Malignaggi can’t punch, and he hasn’t fought in over a year since being stopped in the 4th round by Shawn Porter in April of 2014. Malignaggi took a beating and looked terrible in that fight.
I think boxing fans would prefer to see Garcia fight the winner of the Porter vs. Adrien Broner fight rather than see Garcia fighting Malignaggi. Even the loser of the Broner-Porter fight would be preferable to seeing Garcia fight Malignaggi.
You can make a strong argument that Garcia-Malignaggi is very similar to Garcia’s fight against little Rod Salka from last August. What’s interesting is the Garcia-Salka and Garcia-Malignaggi fight are exactly one year apart. I think it’s quite possible that we’ll see Garcia demolish the light-hitting, aging 34-year-old Malignaggi in one or two rounds on August 1st. The victory, of course, will prove nothing because Malignaggi isn’t a welterweight, he can’t punch, he hasn’t fought in over a year, and he’s not young.
A lot of boxing fans think Garcia has been given two gift decisions in his fights against Lamont Peterson and Mauricio Herrera. They think he lost both of those fights. But they were close enough contests to where Garcia should have gone back and fought them again to prove that he was better than them, but in both cases he felt that he won easily by 4 rounds. You have to wonder whether Garcia will ever admit defeat even once he starts actually losing, which will likely happen as soon as he steps it up a level by facing the likes of Maidana, Mayweather, Porter, Broner, or Brook.
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