BOXING
What is holding up the final contracts in the Gervonta Davis vs Ryan Garcia Fight?
It has been ten days since Golden Boy Boxing announced that the hotly anticipated Gervonta Davis vs Ryan Garcia fight was all but done.
Even in the world of boxing, where fans are used to last-minute problems cropping up, where nothing is done until everything is done, this is starting to get worrisome.
Ten days ago, Oscar De La Hoya announced that the much-anticipated bout between Gervonta Davis and Ryan Garcia was all but made.
On January 17, Golden Boy Boxing announced that they had “finally” received the contract from Gervonta Davis’ camp and that all that remained was for a few details to be hammered out.
Both of these fighters are undefeated and the holdup seems to be around the rematch clause that the contract contains.
This news cuts both ways, since it is a cardinal sin in boxing to look beyond the fighter in front of you, but the fact remains that in the outcome of this fight, one of the two must lose. How that is approached is primordial when it comes to safeguarding a legacy.
De La Hoya is insistent that the fight will go ahead on April 15, and is even making oblique references to a possible trilogy between the two, signalling that he is looking beyond even the rematch.
In the eyes of many fans, Garcia is the weaker of the two fighters, despite the undefeated record. While both fighters punched through some of the same opponents during their career, fighters like Francisco Fonseca and Mario Antonio Macias, the overall level of opposition faced by Davis is generally of a higher caliber.
Handing Yuriorkis Gamboa, Leo Santa Cruz, and Rolando Romero emphatic losses, Tank has a claim on the stiffer competitive road. And as the reigning WBA World Lightweight champion, he commands respect in the ring.
That is not to say that Garcia has been propped up against bums along the way. He has knocked out Fonseca, Javier Fortuna, and Luke Campbell, no mean feat in itself, and got a decisive win over Emmanuel Tagoe.
However, Garcia has been relatively inactive throughout his career, fighting only 23 times in over seven years, with his last four bouts including breaks of 11 and 15 months from the ring. In the buildup to this clash, he has chosen to forego a tune-up fight.
By contrast, Davis has maintained his activity and dealt with Hector Luis Garcia in a dazzling performance just three weeks ago, in a sharpener designed to keep him on the cutting edge.
It is understandable, in light of all of this, that De La Hoya wants to protect his fighter’s future. Opponents would argue that this is evidence that Garcia knows that he can not win. Golden Boy would take the other view, focusing on the money that will be made in this fight and how in boxing, as in any business, you should strike while the iron is hot.
Oscar De La Hoya has said that he expects this fight to sell between two and two-and-a-half million pay per view sales, and the money that all of that represents is a contract detail that is worth getting right.