By: Sean Crose
It had come as quite a surprise – word that the highly anticipated Devin Haney-Ryan Garcia pay per view fight was going to go down in New York, rather than in Las Vegas, as had been expected. It was said the Barclay’s Center in Brooklyn would host the card on April 20th to the delight of east coast fight fans who usually don’t get live events of this magnitude on their side of the country. Again, it was all quite a surprise. Then Garcia posted on social media his belief the fight shouldn’t go down in New York after all. “This is a MGM Vegas fight,” the Californian stated on Friday, “doing everything we can to bring this to Vegas and giving this fight what it deserves!!!”
Garcia then went on to state that his position that the fight belonged out west was nothing personal. “This decision has nothing to do with NYC,” he posted, “but everything to do with business and what I believe is the best move for my career.” Suffice to say, undefeated junior welterweight titlist Haney wasn’t pleased with the confusion. “This dude planning his escape,” he said of Garcia online, “hoe ass n—a talk that tough talk but now talking like a bitch!” Garcia responded by nearly suggesting that he was doing the supremely skilled Haney a favor by virtue of fighting him.
“Why are you trying to paint that picture to the public, towards the guy who is making you more money in your life and in your entire career,” he posted. “Sad to see. That is real hoe behavior which you learned from your dad so I can’t blame you.” Haney proceeded to argue why the Garcia fight couldn’t be held in Nevada. “The reason the fight not happening n vegas is because they don’t wanna affect Canelo ticket sales,” he wrote. Indeed, Canelo’s next fight will likely go down in early May.
Although it’s impossible at the moment to weigh in on this week’s bit of location chaos with any certainty of what the truth might be, it must be noted that Garcia is a fighter who is prone to bring outside the ring drama into the public sphere. Garcia is charming and often admirable, but also confusing. Although he’s never won a world title and lost a superfight last year to Gervonta Davis, Garcia is known to weigh in publicly about all variety of people and things. As with heavyweight titlist Tyson Fury, it’s hard for fans to know exactly what is going on with Garcia’s career at any given time.
