We just witnessed one of the biggest upsets in the last decade, perhaps twenty years of boxing tonight in Brooklyn as Ryan Garcia defeated super lightweight (140 pound) champion Devin Haney in a pretty dominant fashion down the stretch via majority decision. The only fights I can think of off the top upset wise that are of the same magnitude are Broner - Maidana in 2013 when Broner was the heavy favorite, and Canelo vs. Bivol in 2022 with Canelo getting more or less dominated for 12 rounds. Pacquiao - Bradley in 2012 doesn't really count in my book (sorry Tim, love you man but that was a wild scorecard), Cotto - Trout in 2012 could be in that conversation for upsets but not at that scale.
This was one of the most built up fights in quite some time too - will be curious to see how the PPV numbers come out on DAZN. The fight had an interesting flow, with Ryan coming out hot with a near knockdown on a tight left hook to the temple of Haney, but Haney able to fend him off for the next essentially 5.5 rounds, with Ryan landing very little and even getting hurt by a right hand that knocked him back from Haney. But once the 7th round came around, the rest of the fight was a completely different story...
The 7th round was a bludgeoning, and Haney was lucky to make it out of there - the ref Harvey Dock (questionable performance) easily could have called 3 knock downs, but let two 50/50 go forward as slips, and even deducted a point from Ryan with no warning for throwing a punch right at the time of a break. Kind of crazy... a 10-6 round turned into a 9-8 round for the kids scoring at home. He had two other knockdowns to round out the fight and ended up winning a majority decision, which I thought each scorecard was pretty solid (the Danny Dials unofficial scorecard had it 113-111 for Garcia).
Ryan made a whole lot of noise before the fight and did more than just back it up, he cemented himself as one of the biggest stars in boxing, with the most purchasing power of any of the other names in the 135-140 division, even more than Terence Crawford - nobody is selling like Ryan right now. Perhaps it's that Golden Boy connection, he and Oscar are eerily similar in temperament, style, and person. Hats off to the guy - I think Devin Haney was legitimately stunned that the fight was even happening, never mind Ryan looked as good as he did - like I said pre-fight, sometimes the toughest pitchers to face are the guys who you don't have any idea where the ball is going to be upon release, could be at your chin or could be nibbling the outside corner. Ryan played the effectively wild card to perfection tonight.
Real shame that the weight situation somewhat clouds what should simply be an awesome fight - what folks don't necessarily realize is that last extra bit of weight is massive for chin/power within 24 hours of a full on boxing match. So while three pounds may not seem like a lot, it comes up HUGE the following day since your body doesn't need to take as much of a pendulum swing back up after rehydrating. I don't believe the title gets vacated, but still odd that Haney is the titleholder while getting beaten as clearly as he did this evening.
I don't see a purpose for the rematch, at least in the near term - Haney needs to get his wits about him and get back in the lab on that chin. If I'm Ryan, I ride the damn wave and fight again as soon as damn possible - call out for a rematch with Gervonta Davis? Ryan looked significantly stronger tonight than he did when they fought originally last year. We shall see... congrats to my friend Tavis on his victory, he and Ryan can work on their Spanish together when they go fiesta down in TIJUANA when he gets back to the west coast!
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