By Dan Ambrose: Unbeaten lightweight contender Ryan Garcia (17-0, 14 KOs) says he’s going to be sparring middleweight champion Saul Canelo Alvarez (51-1-2, 35 KOs) next week in getting ready for his fight next month against Jose Lopez (20-3-1, 14 KOs) on March 30 in a Golden Boy promoted card at the Fantasy Springs Casino, in Indio, California.
Garcia, 20, is trained by the same trainers, Chepo & Eddy Reynoso, as Canelo. Garcia recently began training with the Reynosos in hopes that they can help develop his career.
It’s hard to know what the rail thin 5’10” Ryan Garcia can get from a sparring session with the stocky 5’8″ Canelo, 28, who competes four divisions above him.
Sparring canelo tuesday
— Ryan Garcia (@Ryankingry) February 15, 2019
Ryan, 20, needs to make a lot of improvements in his game for him to take his career to the next level. He’s ranked #14 with the World Boxing Council at 135, but he’s not shown the kind of talent that suggests that he’s capable of winning a world title in the future. Garcia has gotten a lot of attention on his career due to his social media presence. Ryan ‘The Flash’ Garcia has a lot of followers on Twitter, many of them teenage girls. Unfortunately, Ryan hasn’t done anything with his career to justify the amount of attention that he’s received. Ryan has talked a lot of trash towards super featherweight champion Gervonta ‘Tank’ Davis, and he’s let the boxing public know that he feels he can beat the guy. However, few fans actually give Ryan any chance against Tank Davis, and they suspect that Garcia would be knocked out in the first round if the two of them ever fight each other. Right now, Garcia is so far below Gervonta in the talent department that a fight between them is far-fetched.
5’9″ super featherweight Jose Lopez is close to the same height as the 5’8″ Canelo, but the two of them are vastly different in terms of weight, punching power, hand speed and talent. Canelo is so much better. It’s good that Ryan will get some sparring in with Canelo, but if it’s only going to be at one-quarter speed with Alvarez taking it easy on him, it’s hard to know how much he’s going to get from the session. For the sparring to be useful, Canelo is going to have to come after after Ryan at least three-quarters speed. If Canelo does that, Ryan is going to fold up right away and likely get knocked out. Even with Canelo wearing large gloves and Garcia wearing headgear, this sparring session end badly for Ryan.
Canelo is a beast 😱👀⭐️ pic.twitter.com/ypzM1Pvxho
— GURU (@TheFightGuru) February 14, 2019
Canelo is getting ready for his unification fight against IBF middleweight champion Daniel Jacob (35-2, 29 KOs) on May 4 on Cinco de Mayo on DAZN at the T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas, Nevada. Canelo sparring with the beanpole Ryan Garcia isn’t going to help him prepare for the 5’11 1/2″ Jacobs, who could be close to 190 lbs on the night of the fight on May 4.
There’s now a lot of pressure on Canelo following his win over Gennady Golovkin last September. Canelo is now seen as the #1 fighter in the middleweight division. For him to maintain that position, he’s going to need to beat Jacobs, WBO champion Demetrius Andrade, Billy Joe Saunders and Golovkin [without controversy].
Ryan recently fought on Canelo’s undercard of his fight with WBA Super World super middleweight champion Rocky Fielding on December 15 at Madison Square Garden in New York. Garcia stopped Braulio Rodriguez (194, 17 KOs) in the fifth round of a scheduled 10 round fight. It was a much better performance from Ryan than his previous fight in beating Carlos Morales (17-4, 6 KOs) by a 10 round majority decision last September in Indio, California. Ryan had a lot of problems in beating Morales. That should have been an easy match for Ryan, but it turned out to be a grueling affair for him from start to finish.