With Danny Garcia set to take on Erislandy Lara on a Sept. 14 fight in Las Vegas, Garcia takes some time to talk about having the last two years off, why he doesn’t expect to have much ring rust, and why this fight was the right one for him at this point in his career. Check out some of what he had to say below.
Garcia on why he doesn’t believe his long layoff will affect him in the ring
“I’ve been inactive but I always kept my head in the game. I’m always watching boxing, I always workout, I’m always giving advice to the young guys, I’m always being a mentor, so I feel like even sometimes when you’re not active as long as your head is in the game and you’re still following the sport, you’re still kind of learning, you’re still in it.
“So as far me being inactive, it wasn’t by choice. Boxing took a turn once Showtime stopped doing boxing so basically I just had to sit back and wait my turn and that’s what it was.”
On if he sees something in Lara that made him want this fight
“I definitely feel like I can beat him, I know I can beat him. I feel I could beat anybody if my mind is 100% and I’m physically ready. But I felt like it was an easy fight to get made. I want to be a three-division world champion and I didn’t want to wait around for years and politics get in the way or anything…It could’ve been anybody at that point but he was the perfect person at 160 who’s a champion and who nobody really came to fight either at 160, so who better than Danny Garcia. So I felt like the fight made a lot of sense.”
On how his counterpunching style meshes with someone like Lara
“You can definitely counterpunch the counterpuncher. It’s just you got to have the right technique, you got to know when to throw, when to bait him in, when to put something out there to make him react and you can come back. So there’s definitely ways to counter a guy who waits, but the most important thing for me in this fight is just being myself. Go in there, have fun, get off first, don’t wait, try not to make a lot of mistakes because he’s the type of fighter that if you make mistakes he’s going to try to make you pay.
“He’s a crafty guy, he sticks to the game plan, he doesn’t take any risks, so I have to go in there and fight a smart fight, get my punches off, and just win round by round.”