Danny Garcia needed a mental break from boxing.
The former junior welterweight and welterweight champion competed twice in 2020, once just before the COVID-19 pandemic began and again 10 months later in one of the biggest fights of his career. As thankful as he is to have earned a multi-million-dollar paycheck to box during the middle of a global health crisis, Garcia was exhausted by the time he got to fight night to challenge Spence for his IBF and WBC welterweight titles in December 2020.
The Philadelphia native knew after his 12-round, unanimous-decision defeat to Spence that he needed an extended break from training. The 34-year-old Garcia feels refreshed as he prepares to end a 19-month layoff Saturday night, when he’ll battle Jose Benavidez Jr. in Garcia’s debut as a junior middleweight at Barclays Center in Brooklyn.
“The time off was very important,” Garcia said during an open workout recently at DSG Boxing Gym in Philadelphia. “After you’ve been fighting for a long time, I’ve been fighting world champions for the last ten years, I realized that my body felt great, but my mind felt foggy. I felt tired. It didn’t feel sharp. I knew that I needed my mind to rest, have some fun, and spend some time with my family. I needed time to enjoy everything that I worked so hard for, start to miss the game of boxing and then come back strong. I think that’s what I’ve done.”
When he returned to regular training at the gym he owns in his hometown, a reinvigorated Garcia realized he missed the grind that wore him down before he fought Spence.
“You know what’s crazy? You miss the smell of the gym,” said Garcia, who made his pro debut in November 2007. “When you haven’t been in the gym in a while and you walk in the gym, it’s like your mom’s homecooked food. I missed this.”
Garcia (36-3, 21 KOs) will end a long layoff in their “Showtime Championship Boxing” main event, but Phoenix’s Benavidez (27-1-1, 18 KOs) has fought only once since WBO welterweight champ Terence Crawford (38-0, 29 KOs) stopped him in the 12th round of their title fight in October 2018 at CHI Health Center in Omaha, Nebraska, Crawford’s hometown. Benavidez struggled during his lone appearance in nearly four years, which resulted in a 10-round majority draw with Argentina’s Francisco Torres (17-4-1, 5 KOs) last November 13 at Footprint Center in Phoenix.
The Garcia-Benavidez bout will headline a tripleheader on Showtime that will include a 10-round heavyweight co-feature between Brooklyn’s Adam Kownacki (20-2, 15 KOs) and Turkey’s Ali Demirezen (16-1, 12 KOs). In the network’s 10-round opener, unbeaten junior welterweight contender Gary Antuanne Russell (15-0, 15 KOs), of Capitol Heights, Maryland, is set to encounter Cuba’s Rances Barthelemy (29-1-1, 15 KOs, 1 NC).
Keith Idec is a senior writer/columnist for BoxingScene.com. He can be reached on Twitter @Idecboxing.
