By Edward Chaykovsky
Trainer Robert Garcia is preparing Marcos Maidana (35-3, 31KOs), the WBA welterweight champion, for the fight of his life. Maidana will face heavily favored WBC champion Floyd Mayweather Jr. (45-0, 26KOs) in a unification on May 3rd from the MGM Grand in Las Vegas.
During his long career, Mayweather has fought and beaten some of the best fighters of his era. Garcia is impressed with Mayweather's record, but he also picks Maidana to beat any fighter on Mayweather's record.
"He's fought the best. We would have trouble against someone like [Oscar] De La Hoya, in his prime. But besides that, those [fighters] who stood in front of him like [Jose Luis] Castillo, that would have been a great fight. I think Maidana would beat Castillo. I think Cotto is a tremendous fighter, but I don't think that he would be able to handle the pressure and the punches that Chino throws," Garcia said.
One thing Garcia will not tolerate during the Mayweather fight is complaining. If Maidana get frustrated during the match and comes back to the corner with complaints, then Garcia will let him have it.
"He learned from the [Jesus] Soto-Karass fight that I'm not going to take complaints in the corner - [he told me] 'oh my body is hurting.' I slapped him and said [complaining is] not something that goes with my team because my team don't lose. You also have to motivate the fighter, mentally, and two rounds later he dropped [Soto-Karass] and then stopped him a round later. The same thing with Josesito [Lopez], when he was in pain from those punches to his hip. I had to motivate him to forget about that and go out there and do your job. During the fights, a lot of it has to do with how a trainer mentally pushes his fighter to perform," Garcia said.
