Ryan Garcia feels he should’ve knocked out Devin Haney rather than just beaten him by majority decision, but he puts at least part of the blame on referee Harvey Dock.
While he certainly didn’t complain about getting the nod, and handing Haney the first loss of his professional career, Garcia acknowledged that a finish would’ve been that much sweeter. He set the tone with a huge left hook in the opening round that rattled Haney, but Garcia really took over with a trio of knockdowns that effectively won him the fight.
The first knockdown came in the seventh round, but the advantage on the scorecards was almost immediately negated when Dock paused the action and deducted a point from Garcia for punching after he demanded a break. Instead of being penalized, Garcia feels like he should have been allowed to continue until he put Haney down for good.
“At the end of the day, Harvey Dock, I think he was tripping,” Garcia said post-fight. “He should have stopped that fight. It was bad. [Haney] was really hurt. I felt bad. I even looked at Bill [Haney], I said, ‘Bro, you should probably stop this.’ He didn’t and that’s it.
“The guy was holding me for dear life. I felt an opportunity to keep swinging while my hands were free and I cracked him, and then [Dock] took a point away when I cracked him. But he held me. I should have knocked him out in that seventh round. They stole that from me.”
Even in the moment, Garcia admits he was confused by the referee’s actions.
“That was crazy,” Garcia said. “I never seen some s*** like that. He was holding him and I [punched] him and he was hurt and I was like, ‘Yes! Done! Oh, point taken?’”
Despite the penalty, Garcia continued to pour on the punishment with two more knockdowns in the 10th and 11th rounds that won him the fight.
Thinking back on his performance, Garcia believes he could’ve done even better, but he had a singular purpose to put Haney away and it actually cost him.
“Is this going to be the moment I stop him?” Garcia said of his first thought after dropping Haney in the seventh round. “That’s just all I was thinking. I shouldn’t have put too much pressure on myself to stop him. Because every time I hurt him, I just went crazy. I just couldn’t finish him.
“I was surprised he had such heart and recovery. I cracked him in that first round, I thought it was over. I’m like I won. Easy work. Then he came out firing in the second. He even hurt me with the hook. I was like, damn, maybe he do got a little bit of power.”
Garcia walked into the fight as a massive underdog, with some sportsbooks listing Haney as high as an 8-to-1 favorite to win, but that’s not how things played out on Saturday.
Immediately after the fight, Garcia mentioned he’d gladly accept a rematch, and Haney later said the same after suffering the first defeat of his career.
Once the action cooled down, however, Garcia acknowledged that his body went through a lot in his attempt to get down to 140 pounds for the fight. In the end, Garcia actually missed weight by 3.2 pounds, but the bout still moved forward as scheduled.
With this fight behind him, Garcia isn’t even contemplating another attempt to get down to 140 pounds, and he doubts Haney will pack on enough weight to pursue a rematch with him again. The same goes for Gervonta Davis, who handed Garcia the only loss of his career when Garcia made the ill-fated decision to go all the way down to 136 pounds to face “Tank,” ultimately getting finished with a brutal body shot in the seventh round.
“I don’t think Tank’s going to beat Frank Martin, but if he did, he wouldn’t fight me because I’m moving up,” Garcia said. “I’m not doing 140. I’m going 147. I can’t make f****** 140. I never even technically fought at 140. I fought every time at 143. My body can’t literally go lower than 143. It’s impossible. I tried every technique. Can’t do it.”
With plans to go up in weight, Garcia had at least one name in mind for a future opponent, although he’s not cemented on anything just yet.
“I had a vision to fight [Sebastian] Fundura at 154 [pounds],” Garcia said. “I don’t know why, I just feel I could knock him out. I know that’s really, really random. I just feel like I could get the title at 154.
“I fought guys that big before and I’ve knocked them out in sparring. Cold, slept them. I want to do it. Shout out Fundura, no disrespect.”
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