Brandon Rios vs. Danny Garcia in December

By Dan Ambrose: Former lightweight champion Brandon “Bam Bam” Rios (34-3-1, 25 KOs) revealed on Sunday night that he’ll be facing Danny “Swift” Garcia (33-1, 19 KOs) this December in a fight in New York. Rios, 31, says he’ll be either fighting Garcia in the second or the last part of December.

According to Rios, this is a fight that they both want. Garcia wants the fight, and Rios wants it.
Garcia, 29, is going to take a lot of criticism from the boxing fans once news of this fight with Rios is officially announced. Garcia could have fought Errol Spence Jr., Shawn Porter, Terence Crawford or Jeff Horn. Those are fights that would have made a lot more sense for Garcia to take instead of fighting Rios, who arguably is little more than a journeyman fighter at this point. Rios’ record in his last 6 fights should be 2-4 instead of 3-3, which is pretty bad as well.

Rios has fought only once in the last 2 years in beating Aaron Herrera by a 7th round knockout on June 11. Before that, Rios hasn’t fought since he was stopped in the 9th round by Tim Bradley on November 7, 2015.

“My understanding, right now, they’re working on the Danny Garcia fight,” said Rios to Fighthype. “I think they’re talking about the second week of December or late December. We’re going to do that fight in New York. We’re in negotiations right now with that fight. That’ll be my next fight. He wants it. I want it. He says he wants to fight me in his next fight. We’ll have to see how the fight goes. We both can bang. We both have power. So we got to see how the fight plays out when it happens,” said Rios.

This fight is a waste of time for Garcia. He should be fighting Porter, Spence, Crawford or Horn. Garcia could fight any of those guys if he wanted. Instead, Garcia chooses to fight Rios. It makes no sense at all. It gives the appearance that Garcia is matched selectively against the weaker guys instead of fighting the best.

Rios has looked like a shot fighter ever since 2013 when he was beaten by Mile Alvarado and Manny Pacquiao. Both fights were embarrassing to watch due to how badly Rios fought. Rios has won 3 out of his last 6 fights. Rios’ 9th round disqualification win over Diego Chaves in August 2014 was controversial. Chaves looked like he was on his way to winning the fight.

Rios says he’s not interested in taking a tune-up fight to get him ready for the fight with Garcia. Rios says his fight with Aaron Herrera was his tune-up, and he doesn’t need any more of them.

“Why do I need a tune-up?” said a very defensive sounding Rios when asked if he needs a tune-up fight first. I’ve been boxing for a while. There’s no such thing as a tune-up. I already got my tune-up. My last fight was supposedly a tune-up fight. I got it out of the way. That was my comeback fight. I’ve been in this position before as athlete, as a champion, as a fighter. You’ve got to come ready no matter what. I’m in the second half of my career. I’m more focused, more dedicated to it, more serious,” said Rios.

Garcia has talked a lot about wanting to fight a rematch with WBA/WBC welterweight champion Keith “One Time” Thurman, who beat him by a 12-round split decision on March 4 of this year. It’s disappointing that Garcia has now been out of the ring for the last 7 months since the Thurman fight despite top fighters like Spence, Porter and Crawford all wanting to fight him. Spence is even willing to give Garcia a title shot.

It’s bad that Garcia bypassing a world title shot against Spence to fight the down in his luck Rios, a fighter that has lost 3 out of his last 6 fights. Garcia talks a lot about how he wants to fight the best, but in looking at his resume for the last 4 years, only 2 names stand out and that’s Thurman and Lucas Matthysse. The rest of the guys Garcia has fought since 2013 have been weaker opponents.

Here are the last 7 fights for Danny Garcia since 2013:

• Keith Thurman

• Samuel Vargas

• Robert Guerrero

• Paulie Malignaggi

• Lamont Peterson

• Rod Salka

• Mauricio Herrera

Those are not great fighters except for Thurman. Garcia hasn’t stepped it up for some reason. When he was at 140, Garcia failed to fight Viktor Postol and Terence Crawford. At 147, Garcia still hasn’t fought Spence, Porter or Jeff Horn.

Rios looked good in his last fight against Herrera, but that wasn’t a good opponent. Before that fight, Rios had looked like a shot fighter that had seen better days. He doesn’t fight like he used to back when he was fighting in the lightweight division many years ago. Some boxing fans point out that Rios is hard to understand now when he speaks. They feel that Rios slurs his speech when he talks, and they see this as a sign that he’s punch drunk and has taken way too much punishment to the head.

Garcia did not look good in the first 6 rounds of his last fight against Thurman. Garcia was beaten to the punch, and looked way too slow to compete with Thurman. The only reason Garcia could come on to make the fight closer is because Thurman got tired and started coasting in the second half of the fight. This gave Garcia confidence, and he then came on to win a lot of rounds in the last 6 rounds. It’s a fight that Thurman would have easily won if he hadn’t backed off the way he did.

Garcia has the power advantage, but not by much. Rios can punch, especially to the body. If Rios can take the power shots from Garcia and force him to brawl, he could possibly knock him out. I’m not expecting that to happen. Garcia will likely use his boxing ability and try and jab and move to avoid Rios. Garcia sometimes throws a lot of low blows. I wouldn’t be surprised if that happens against Rios. Most likely, we’ll see Garcia jab, move and hold a lot like he did against Matthysse.

Garcia needs to start facing better opposition on a continual basis instead of selecting so many weaker opponents to pad his record with. Garcia’s fights against Vargas, Malignaggi and Salka are perfect examples of the soft match-making he’s had done. The way that Thurman dominated Garcia when he was trying, it was a mismatch entirely. In the rematch, I expect Thurman to beat him again.