All of The Questions on Danny Garcia Are About To Be Answered

By Andreas Hale

Despite being unbeaten and the current WBC welterweight champion, there are still a ton of unanswered questions regarding Danny Garcia.

But on Saturday, we’re going to learn whether or not “Swift” is for real or a fighter who is keeping the title warm for Keith Thurman.

Since making his debut, Garcia has been pegged as a star in the sport. His impressive run from 2011 to 2013 saw him go on a string of impressive victories over some recognizable names: Nate Campbell, Kendall Holt, Erik Morales (twice), Amir Khan and Zab Judah. His run culminated with a high profile fight with Lucas Matthysse on the undercard of Floyd Mayweather’s monster showdown with Canelo Alvarez that very few boxing pundits thought he could win.

But he did. 

And he did it on the biggest stage of his career.

Garcia had the boxing world in the palm of his hand after his thoroughly impressive showing against Matthysse that silenced the naysayers. It was at this very moment that Garcia should have pushed and shoved his way into stardom. But, somehow, he managed to blow it.

And we shouldn’t necessarily say “he” but somebody dropped the ball. He certainly played a role in this by not demanding more because there were a number of instances where he could have called out Floyd Mayweather but he decided against it.

Perhaps he knew something we didn’t.

His next fight was in his parents’ homeland of Puerto Rico as Garcia was in a showcase fight of sorts against Mauricio Herrera. But it wasn’t a showcase. Far from it. Herrera gave Garcia hell for 12 rounds and arguably should have handed Swift his first loss of his professional career. However, the judges in Puerto Rico had their own brand of home cooking in the kitchen and gifted Garcia with a majority decision. It wouldn’t be the last time that Garcia escaped with his ‘0’ intact.

He did himself no favors by facing Rod Salka in his next fight and promptly dispatched of his foe in a grotesque mismatch. The momentum that he had built was swiftly (pun intended) evaporating.

Garcia would then face Lamont Peterson on NBC primetime television and failed to impress. For much of the fight, Peterson deployed a deft boxing approach where he used movement along with a jab to make Garcia looks slow and one-dimensional. To his credit, Garcia did attack the body well and didn’t take himself out of the fight mentally. Where Peterson went wrong is that he waited a round too late to jumpstart his attack and lost a majority decision.

Garcia’s next two opponents were a bit shopworn in Paulie Malignaggi and Robert Guerrero and a 7th round TKO over yet another overmatched opponent in Samuel Vargas had effectively taken the air out of Garcia’s balloon.

All that momentum that he built up from 2011 to 2013 was undone in three years thanks to uneven performances and underwhelming opposition.

One thing that has always held true about Garcia is that everyone knows he’s a talented fighter but he seems to fight to the level of his competition rather than compete at a high level every time out. The Garcia who looked brilliant against Matthysse looked completely beatable against Peterson and Herrera. If you put his performances side by side, you’ll be hard pressed to convince people that it is the same fighter in those fights. But he has an opportunity to shut the naysayers down yet again when he faces Keith Thurman, who is a 2 to 1 favorite according to Sportsbook Review.

For his part, Thurman’s career has gone opposite of Garcia. Although “One Time” hasn’t demonstrated the scintillating power that he did early in his career, he has faced stiffer opposition and excelled. His war with Shawn Porter was his “Matthysse Moment” although he wasn’t the overwhelming underdog that Garcia was against the Argentinean. Nevertheless, he showcased his grit against an object of force and forward momentum in Porter that led to him earning a unanimous decision. Momentum is the primary reason that Thurman is the favorite.

And here Garcia is, an underdog again. Maybe he thrives in this role where the chips are stacked against him. Perhaps it is what motivates him to put on exceptional performances. Some people function better when they aren’t favored to win and Garcia could prove to be that kind of fighter.

A victory against Thurman would put the Philly fighter back into the conversation as one of the best pound for pound fighters in the sport. A loss will likely find his detractors simply stating “I told you so.”

It’s up to Garcia to figure out which side of history he wants to be on. Will he falter when the spotlight is shining bright and the fans are expecting Thurman to put an emphatic blemish on his unbeaten record? Or, will he again rise to the occasion and put together a performance worthy of recognition. Up until this point, he has allowed lesser opposition to bring him down. But that cannot happen anymore. He has 33 wins in his pocket and it is time to prove to the world that he is not to be underestimated. But the only way he can do that is by putting his hands on Thurman and becoming the fighter we all expected him to be.