Although lightweight Ryan “Kingry” Garcia has never had a big fight, never faced a top opponent and only has 15 professional bouts, he has more than 1.1 million followers on Instagram and stunningly drew nearly 7,000 fans to the StubHub Center in Carson, California, for his last fight on May 4 as the headliner of a Golden Boy Boxing on ESPN card.
The stands that night were filled with Garcia’s chief fan base — screaming teenage girls and their parents. One would have to go back to the mid-1990s to find a similar scene during the rise of the Golden Boy himself, Oscar De La Hoya, who happens to be Garcia’s promoter and who knows a thing or two about attracting fans beyond hardcore boxing aficionados.
“He has the charisma and he has the ‘it’ factor,” De La Hoya told ESPN. “It’s a matter of testing him up in the ring and if he passes the test with flying colors we have something special on our hands. I’m actually guiding his career very carefully and paying attention to his career very carefully because with this guy’s following and his potential he can be the next superstar in boxing.”
Garcia, the 2017 ESPN.com prospect of the year, has grown his fan base on social media in large part thanks to his boyish good looks and the entertaining and fun-filled training videos he regularly posts, not to mention the occasional wacky video of him displaying funky dance moves.
“I want to see that if he can’t knock Morales out, I want to see him try to stop him. I want to see that killer instinct. Ryan Garcia can box, he can fight, he can move, he has the looks, he has the charisma, he has 1.1 million followers on Instagram. I think we have the real deal but Carlos is no walk in the park. He should be a real test.”
Oscar De La Hoya on Ryan Garcia
Asked how it was possible for a fighter who has yet to have a big fight or win a title, and who has had only limited national television exposure, connect with so many fans, Garcia, who turned 20 on April 8, said, “The fun I bring to it. I’m trying to involve the fans and bring in a crowd where not only do they love boxing but they love me as a person. The generation now is on social media so you have to use that to bring in that type of crowd into boxing.”
Garcia continued, “I think it’s the energy I bring. People love positivity and I think that’s what I show. I work on my technique but when I do a video I want people to be amazed by the speed or the power. The casual fans don’t care if your hands are up or your hands are down. They just want to see you knocking people out and having fun and they like me because I’m a kid, I guess. I think that’s what it is and girls like me. I’m not gonna get into that.”
Garcia laughed as he made his remark about his female fan base, but he knows he could easily be on the cover of a teen magazine.
“You just have to be yourself,” he said. “The hardcore fans will always love it but you have to involve the casual people too and that’s what I do.”
But Garcia also is more than just a pretty face, something he hopes to continue to pound the point home by performing well when takes a bit of a step up in competition against Carlos Morales on Saturday (Facebook Watch, 9 p.m. ET) at the Fantasy Springs Resort Casino in Indio, California.
The scheduled 10-round lightweight fight is the main event of the second “Golden Boy Fight Night” card that will stream live on Facebook Watch as part of the promotional company’s deal with the social media giant.
“Whether (Morales) thinks I’m a kid or that I’m always on social media — that’s irrelevant,” Garcia said. “What matters is what will happen in the ring. For this fight, you can expect big numbers. It will set new precedents. This Facebook deal was made for me!
“I expect for him to come in shape. He has a lot of experience against some pretty good opposition like Alberto Machado, but I also see some weaknesses that I feel I could expose. I feel way better (for) this fight than the last fight. I’ve had a long training camp. This fight will be at 135 (pounds). I’m not saying I can’t make 130 but we’re just going to go for the 135 this fight.”
Garcia has been campaigning at junior lightweight, where he has boxed for several years. But he is beginning to feel the strains of making that weight, so this fight will be at lightweight.
“I don’t see a much longer career at 130. Maybe if I get a title (shot),” Garcia said. “I’m growing. I’ve been at 130 since I was 16. My body is filling out, I’m changing. You won’t see me much longer at 130.”
Garcia’s bout on May 4 was against former featherweight world title challenge Jayson Velez and although Garcia scored a near-shutout decision win, he was not at all happy with his performance and is expecting a better one against Morales.
“That fight (against Velez) was very short notice for me because I thought I was going to fight on the Canelo (Alvarez)-GGG (Gennady Golovkin) card (on May 5) but then you know what happened. It got canceled and I stopped training,” said Garcia, who will go into the fight with Morales with new head trainer Danny Luna replacing his father, Henry Garcia, who remains in the corner as an assistant. “Then when I heard I was going to fight again I had like two weeks to get to 130 pounds. So the whole camp I was just worried about getting to 130 pounds. But that’s no excuse for me. I go in there, I boxed, I hurt my hand.
“If you watch the fight I hurt him many times in the fight, I just couldn’t finish him because my hands were still healing and they were hurting every time I punched him. It was a mediocre performance. That wasn’t my best. I could do way better than that. You’re only as good as your last fight, so I can’t wait until this one because I had whole training camp.”
“The fun I bring to it. I’m trying to involve the fans and bring in a crowd where not only do they love boxing but they love me as a person. The generation now is on social media so you have to use that to bring in that type of crowd into boxing.”
Ryan Garcia on his popularity on social media
Two fights ago, Morales (17-2-3, 6 KOs), 28, a Mexico native fighting out of Los Angeles, lost a 10-round decision to Machado, who went on to win a junior lightweight world title in his next fight.
“We had a solid eight week training camp. Now it’s time to perform. Ryan Garcia cannot knock me out,” Morales said. “We’re going to make it a smart fight during every single second of every round. All of my fights have been again tough contenders, and that has given me a lot of confidence. I’ve known Ryan Garcia for a while. We used to train at the same gym and he has the same goofball personality that he’s always had. But this is business, and there will be no games when we step in the ring.”
De La Hoya is a strong believer in Garcia’s potential. When he signed Garcia (15-0, 13 KOs), of Victorville, California, who was 215-15 and won 15 national titles as an amateur, he proclaimed that it was Golden Boy’s most important signing since a young Canelo Alvarez in 2010.
So far De La Hoya has not seen anything to change his mind.
“I think he’s on the fast track,” De La Hoya said. “The Velez fight showed me what he’s made of. He obviously knew that he made some mistakes. He needs to correct a few things in his arsenal that he needs to work on. But Ryan Garcia is on the fast track and possibly to fighting in a world title fight in the first quarter of next year.
“Ryan has the talent, he has the amateur pedigree. This fight on Saturday will tell us a lot. It’s a good step up from Velez.”
If Garcia wins, De La Hoya said he would be back for another fight in December, possibly on the next Alvarez undercard.
“We have a big event that we’re gunning for in December in Las Vegas or in New York and he would be on that,” De La Hoya said.
Should Alvarez defeat Gennady Golovkin in their Sept. 15 rematch, De La Hoya said there’s a good chance Alvarez will headline the December event.
De La Hoya said what he wants to see from Garcia on Saturday is an effort to get a knockout even if he doesn’t deliver one.
“I want to see that if he can’t knock Morales out, I want to see him try to stop him,” De La Hoya said. “I want to see that killer instinct. Ryan Garcia can box, he can fight, he can move, he has the looks, he has the charisma, he has 1.1 million followers on Instagram. I think we have the real deal but Carlos is no walk in the park. He should be a real test.”
As far as Garcia is concerned, he can’t move quickly enough in his career.
“I’ve talked to Oscar about it,” he said. “We’re going to take our time but I’m the type of person who wants it all right now. I need that title right now. I want to fight (titlist) Gervonta (Davis) right now. People have to hold me back. I just love challenges. Everybody wait up and see. Everybody say what they want. My time will come.”