While Mikey Garcia successfully unified his WBC lightweight title with Robert Easter Jr’s IBF strap with a comfortable points decision win at the Staples Center in Los Angeles, California on Saturday night, all of the post-fight talk was about another fight that a week ago would’ve seemed like pure fantasy.
LA’s Garcia, 39-0 (30), stunned the boxing world last week when he revealed plans to move up two weight classes to face Texan tornado Errol Spence Jr 24-0 (21) for the IBF welterweight title before the end of the year.
“I’m here for the biggest challenges,” said Garcia, 30, who unified a title for the first time in his career. “I don’t know if there is anyone that is a bigger challenge than Errol Spence. I know he’s up to fight everyone so let’s make it happen. I think it can be made.
“I think that’s the next big fight coming up. I feel I have the power and the skillset to compete in any division up to welterweight. He’s the toughest guy at welterweight so I want to face him.”
During an interview at the Showtime host desk, Spence revealed he was also agreeable to the fight.
“I feel like that’s the best fight available for me right now with Shawn [Porter] and Danny [Garcia] fighting [each other for the vacant WBC title] in September. [WBA super champion] Keith Thurman is still recovering and needs a tune up,” Spence said.
“He’s daring to be great, he wants to be great, he wants to move up and dethrone me and it’s not going to happen.
“It’s definitely going to be an easy fight. He will be pound-for-pound No. 1 if he beats me. He has great skills but I see myself winning. I don’t really see anything that concerns me. He’s technically good, but I don’t see him hurting me at 147.”
