Danny Garcia Squandering His Reputation with Another Lackluster Fight

The buzzards have been circling since it was announced Wednesday that WBC welterweight champion Danny Garcia will take yet another disappointing fight when he faces Samuel Vargas in a 10-round non-title bout November 12 in Philadelphia.

Mike Coppinger of USA Today reported that a deal has also been reached for Garcia to unify 147-pound titles with Keith Thurman early next year.

That would make this fight a tune-up, but given the Philadelphian's recent opposition, you would be forgiven thinking it's just business as usual.

There are tune-up fights, and there are complete wastes of time. This is the latter.

You don’t even need to watch.

It’s already over.

Premier Boxing Champions spokesperson Tim Smith told Coppinger that the Thurman-Garcia bout has already been set for early next year, but who knows? 

Even if that contest is signed and sealed—as opposed to a verbal agreement—it’s not enough to excuse another gross mismatch from a fighter who has feasted on soft opponents the last three years.

Reaction from fans and media has been universally negative to Garcia's—one of the sport’s better fighters—decision to face an opponent who was blown out by prospect-level Errol Spence last year.

Thurman, who has been highly critical of his possible future foe, threw some shade at him via Twitter:

Spence also couldn’t hold his tongue.

“Danny [said] I have to pay my dues, but he [is] fighting somebody I [have] knocked out already,” Spence said, per Carlos Boogs of Boxing Scene.

Terence Crawford, who earlier in the year had a back-and-forth with Garcia on Twitter regarding a possible fight, found this one laughable:

It’s just the latest blow to the reputation of a fighter who has squandered every drop of the goodwill he earned with a pair of star-making wins over Amir Khan and Lucas Matthysse. Those wins came four and three years ago respectively.

The only thing Garcia has seemed terribly concerned with in recent years is continuously lowering the bar and finding ways to more thoroughly scrape the bottom of the barrel.

All you have to do is look at the opponent-selection process for this fight.

Garcia was long rumored to be heading toward a defense against former welterweight titlist Andre Berto.

That fight was hugely disappointing to fans, who have been demanding more, but it looks like a positively delicious matchup given how far down the rabbit hole we’ve traveled.

Berto thrashed Garcia in September for not making the deal and making it seem like his purse demands were the cause.

"Everybody knows how [Garcia] gets down—you know what I mean," Berto told Ben Thompson of Fight Hype. "I ain't knocking [Garcia's] style of trying to fight less for the most money. Man, that's all good, but don't try to throw me in like I'm outpricing myself or I'm ducking you."

Berto also said on his social media that Garcia had elected to pass him by in favor of a fight with John Molina Jr., who isn’t ranked at 147 pounds, mostly because he’s never fought there as a professional.

If Berto were bad, then Molina was worse. And what came next was indefensible.

Ethan Miller/Getty Images

World Boxing News detailed in late September that representatives for Garcia had reached out to Matchroom Boxing head Eddie Hearn with a lowball offer for a fight with thrice-beaten Sam Eggington.

"Who’s that?" That's the correct reaction when thinking of a fighter who was well beaten by Bradley Skeete just two fight prior to receiving an offer to face one of the top fighters in the division.

The WBC ranks Eggington as the No. 24 welterweight contender in the world, and he doesn’t even rate in the rankings of the other three sanctioning bodies. That’s how close we came to another Rod Salka.

Vargas is as underwhelming as it gets.

The welterweight division is a land of plenty.

There are so many salivating fights that could be made (most coming against guys who, like Garcia, are in the Al Haymon stable and easy to make), which makes the Berto, Molina, Eggington and Vargas types completely inexcusable.

The tune-up excuse might work on some people, but it ignores the fact Garcia’s inactivity hasn’t been the result of circumstance. It’s been a choice, one that seems part of a calculated effort to find the weakest opponent possible.

Vargas has virtually zero chance of winning this fight.

He'll make a decent payday as the fans are stuck with a fight nobody wanted.

It’s a sham, and Garcia deserves all the blame.