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Oscar De La Hoya wants Ryan Garcia to fight living legend in his next bout

Ryan Garcia with promoter Oscar De La Hoya. Photo credit: Liliana Heredia/Golden Boy Promotions

The promoter of Ryan Garcia 23-1 (19) has put forward a surprise name as his next opponent.

The 24-year-old Garcia from Los Angeles is coming off a seventh-round knockout loss to WBA ‘Regular’ lightweight titleholder Gervonta ‘Tank’ Davis last month. Garcia was down in the second and again in the seventh from a body shot.

Now Garcia’s promoter Oscar De La Hoya want him to face a legendary boxer he lost to 15 years ago.

That boxer, of course, is Manny Pacquiao 62-8-2 (39).

The Filipino phenom is 44 years old and officially retired two years ago after losing his WBA welterweight crown to Yordenis Ugas 27-5 (12) by unanimous points decision in Las Vegas in August 2021.

Garcia has campaigned for most of his career at lightweight. He moved up to junior welterweight last year, winning a wide unanimous decision against Emmanuel Tagoe in April before stopping Javier Fortuna in six frames in July. The Davis fight took place at a catchweight of 136-pounds.

“I’m going to give you guys the exclusive here. I’m also looking at Manny Pacquiao,” De La Hoya said to FightHype.

“Manny versus Ryan, do you know how huge that would be? That’s bigger than anything on the table now. I got a few tricks up my sleeve. It would be like a catchweight. I’m not sure what, but I’m going to pursue that and all the other options. We’ll see what the best option is for Ryan.”

One of those other options could be Rolando ‘Rolly’ Romero 15-1 (13) who claimed the vacant WBA junior welterweight title with a dubious ninth-round stoppage of Ismael Barroso 24-4-2 (22) in a fight he was losing on the cards earlier this month.

“Rolly Romero, he’s a character man. Yeah, he’s cool. I like him. He’s he’s a hard worker that’s cool he’s a hard worker and he deserves a shot. He deserves, you know, whatever he’s he’s making now. It’ll be an entertaining fight,” De La Hoya said.

“If either Al Haymon picks up the phone and calls me or I call him, and he picks up the phone. That’s his promoter. I’m Ryan’s promoter, so let’s make the fight happen.

“That’s the only way it’s going to happen and I want to make the fight. That’s all it’s going to take. That’s all.

“Obviously, me as Ryan Garcia’s promoter, I’m going to get him the best deal possible. He’s in it for the money obviously. He’s in it for the glory, but me, my obligation is to get him the best deal possible. That’s what I have to do. I have to look at all these other fighters.

Another name in the frame is former unified lightweight champion Teofimo Lopez 18-1 (13) who is set to face WBO junior welterweight champion Josh Taylor 19-0 (13) on June 10.

“I’m looking at Teofimo carefully against Taylor that’s coming up,” De La Hoya said. “It’s coming up on the same night as [Jaime] Munguia, so it depends on what makes sense.”

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