By Chris Williams: Matchroom promoter Eddie Hearn says Gervonta Davis is psychologically in a better position than Ryan Garcia to win their battle in April when they meet for their mega-fight on Showtime PPV.
Hearn notes that Ryan (23-0, 19 KOs) has had recent problems psychologically, and although he’s come back from that, he’s not yet fought anyone near the level of ‘Tank’ Davis (28-0, 26 KOs) since then.
Indeed, the 24-year-old Ryan has fought just once since returning from his mental health issues, beating a washed-up 33-year-old Javier Fortuna, who had been soundly defeated just a year before Joseph ‘Jojo’ Diaz in 2021.
Fortuna is NOT the type of opposition Kingry Garcia needed to fight to show that he was past problems and ready to tackle a fighter at Gervonta’s level. You hate to say it, but Fortuna was another gimme opponent for the Golden Boy promoted Ryan, similar to his mismatches against these easy marks:
- Emmanuel Tagoe
- Luke Campbell
- Francisco Fonseca
- Romero Duno
If you know anything about boxing, you’d understand that those fighters were the equivalent of low-hanging fruit for Ryan Garcia to pick off and be made to look good against.
In other words, these were all showcase fights to give the impression that Ryan was the real thing when it’s pretty apparent that it’s all smoke & mirrors, as we see many times in the sport.
“There’s a lot of questions about Ryan Garcia, but he keeps answering them to a certain level, but he’s yet to fight people at a certain level as consistently as Gervonta Davis,” said Eddie Hearn to the DAZN Boxing Show.
“But he’s going to get hit against Ryan Garcia. Ryan Garcia is very long; he has very fast hands; where he struggled a little bit against Hector Garcia was the range,” said Hearn.
It’s difficult to agree with Hearn when he says that Ryan Garcia “keeps answering” the questions about his career, as he’s not faced anyone that was near good enough for him to prove that he’s not just a carefully packaged Instagram fighter, who has the right look to attract a big audience.
Moreover, Ryan has 9 million Instagram followers, many of which will eagerly purchase his fight with Tank Davis.
Ryan would have to beat these types of fighters to prove he’s not a mirage:
- Shakur Stevenson
- Frank Martin
- Vasyl Lomachenko
- Devin Haney
- Regis Prograis
“Ryan Garcia has an even longer range and more power than Hector Garcia. I give Ryan Garcia a shot in this fight,” said Hearn.
“He [Ryan] came through his mental health battle. In a close fight, I give the edge to the person I know psychologically who is in a better position, Gervonta Davis,” said Hearn.