Ellerbe: Danny Garcia has the best resume other than Canelo and Pacquiao

By Boxing News - 02/10/2018 - Comments

Image: Ellerbe: Danny Garcia has the best resume other than Canelo and Pacquiao

By Allan Fox: Leonard Ellberbe of Mayweather Promotions is VERY high on former 2 division world champion Danny ‘Swift’ Garcia (33-1, 19 KOs), saying he has the best resume in the sport outside of Saul Canelo Alvarez and Manny Pacquiao.

(Photo credit: Chet Susslin/SHOWTIME)

According to Ellerbe, the 29-year-old Garcia only knows how to win. Ellerbe says it’s nonsense that Garcia is afraid of facing some of the top fighters. He says Garcia wants to fight the best and he’s shown that in the past.

Garcia WON’T be fighting the best in his next fight in facing Brandon ‘Bam Bam’ Rios (34-3-1, 25 KOs) next Saturday night on February 17 on Showtime Boxing at the Mandalay Bay Resort Events Center in Las Vegas, Nevada. Rios was never one of the best at 147, and he was never one of the best at 140 either. For a short period of time, Rios held the WBA lightweight title from February 2011 to December 2011. That’s pretty much Rios’ claim to fame. He held the WBA 135 lb. title for exactly 10 months before he lost the belt after he failed to make weight for his title defense against John Murray in December 2011.

“All Danny Garcia has done is know how to win,” Ellerbe said to Fighthype in talking about Danny Garcia. “That’s what Danny Garcia does. He knows how to win. All that talk out there about him being afraid of guys, that’s just nonsense. He just wants to fight the best fighters and win, and he’s proven that.”

The reason why Garcia is seen as being afraid of fighters is he left the 140 lb. division when he was going to have to defend his WBC light welterweight title against Viktor Postol. That move looked like Garcia was running from Postol. When Garcia moved up to 147, he fought Robert ‘The Ghost’ Guerrero for the vacant WBC welterweight title in January 2016. That was the World Boxing Council letting Garcia fight a weak opponent for their WBC welterweight title. Shawn Porter was available and ranked above Guerrero.

For some reason, the WBC let Garcia fight Guerrero rather than Porter. That move made Garcia look like he was swerving Porter. After Danny Garcia became the WBC 147 lb. champion, he chose to fight a weak opponent in Samuel Vargas, who the WBC chose not to sanction for a title defense. Garcia could have defended the WBC title against Porter, but instead he took a soft opponent in Samuel Vargas. The boxing public saw that move by Garcia and felt that he was afraid of Porter, and didn’t want to mix it up with him. So instead of fighting Porter, Garcia fought fringe contender Vargas.

”He has one of the best resumes in the sport. On the top of my head, I can only think of 2 fighters that have a better resume than him who are active and that’s probably Manny [Pacquiao] and [Saul] Canelo [Alvarez],” Ellerbe said about Danny Garcia. ”Other than that, Danny Garcia probably has the best resume in the entire sport. He’s fought 10 current or former champions, and he’s not even 30-years-old. That is phenomenal. They need to put some respect on that man’s name. Danny Garcia is a talented fighter, and one of the best fighters in the sport,” Ellerbe said.

Garcia has faced a lot of name fighters, but many of them were over-the-hill and BADLY faded when he fought them.

These are the best wins over FADED fighters on Danny Garcia’s resume:

Erik Morales – way past his prime at the time Garcia fought

Zab Judah

Paulie Malignaggi

Robert Guerrero

Kendall Holt

Nate Campbell

Those 6 fighters were very good former world champions during their prime, but they were over-the-hill and in most cases fighting ABOVE their weight class by the time Danny Garcia was matched against them. Morales was at his best at 122 as a world champion. He fought Garcia at welterweight for their first fight in March 2012, and he almost beat him. Garcia did stop Morales in the 4th round in their rematch in October 2012, but it was an empty win due to how old and far above his ideal weight class he was.

Zab Judah had recently been knocked out by Amir Khan in 5 rounds at the time he fought Garcia in April 2013. Garcia beat Judah by a 12 round unanimous decision, but it was a fairly close and competitive fight. It would have been interesting to see how Garcia would have done against Judah when he was in his prime 13 years earlier in his career before he lost for the first time to Kostya Tszyu in November 2001. Judah was lightning fast back then. He slowed way down by the time he fought Garcia.

Garcia’s best wins over still in their prime name fighters during his 11-year pro career have come against these guys:

Amir Khan

Lucas Matthysse

Mauricio Herrera

Lamont Peterson

Peterson wasn’t really at his best any longer after his fight with Khan in December 2011. Peterson stayed out of the ring for 14 months after his close 12 round split decision win over Khan in December 2011. Peterson came back to defeat Kendall Holt by an 8th round knockout in February 2013, but then he lost his next fight in being blown out in 3 rounds by Matthysse in May 2013. Peterson fought a couple of times against weak opposition in 2014 before facing Danny Garcia in April 2015. I don’t think Peterson was mentally ready for the Garcia fight due to him not having been kept busy against quality fighters. Peterson could have beaten Garcia if that fight had taken place in 2011 when he was busy with his career.

A lot of boxing fans believe that Mauricio Herrera beat Garcia. That was a controversial win for Garcia over Herrera.

Garcia’s best win of his career was his 12 round decision victory over Matthysse. That match was a terrible low blow clinic for Garcia with him hitting Matthysse with low blows all night long and getting away with it. With a good referee working the fight, Garcia could have lost as many as 3 points for low blows. It was that bad. It wasn’t much of a win due to the fouling that Garcia got away with, and the knockout that he scored, which came after he shoved Matthysse into the ropes. Matthysse got tangled on the ropes after being pushed hard. While Matthysse was trying to entangle himself, Garcia threw a 3-punch combination that knocked him down. It looked a cheap move on Garcia’s part to shove Matthysse and then tee off on him while he was helpless trying to disentangle himself from the ropes. The referee let Garcia get away with the shoving and hitting Matthysse while he was tangled in the ropes.

Garcia picking a weak opponent in Rios for his next fight on February 17th puts a lot of pressure on him to win and look good in doing so. If Rios beats Garcia, it’s going to make him look bad. Garcia is in a no-win situation with that fight. Since Rios is coming into the fight with him with a 3-3 record in his last 6 fights, Garcia must beat him and do it in style. A loss for Garcia will be a signal that he doesn’t possess the talent to be one of the major players at 147. Yeah, Garcia was recently the WBC welterweight champion, but that was because he fought Robert Guerrero for the vacant belt. Garcia didn’t mix it up with Porter or Spence to win the WBC title, and he didn’t defend the title. Garcia fought Samuel Vargas instead.

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