Unbeaten Garcia braces for Judah bout
NEW YORK: Unbeaten Danny Garcia says he’s “100 percent ready” to defend his World Boxing Council and World Boxing Association light welterweight belts on challenger Zab Judah’s home turf in Brooklyn on Saturday.
“I’m ready to take over Brooklyn,” Garcia said, predicting fans from his hometown of Philadelphia would out-number Judah’s supporters.
“I guarantee I’ll have more fans than Zab has coming to the fight,” he said.
Garcia, 25- 0 with 16 knockouts, was to have defended his 140-pound (63.5kg) titles against Judah on February 9, but the bout was postponed when he sustained a rib injury in training.
With the injury behind him, Garcia said his preparation has been “perfect.”
Everything was on point— sparring, running, training, conditioning. Everything went perfect,” he said.
Plenty of verbal sparring has marked the build-up to the fight, including Judah crashing a Garcia media availability at a New York sporting goods store.
Promoter Oscar de la Hoya, citing “tension in the air,” took the unusual step of holding a split prefight press conference on Thursday.
Judah, a 35- year- old veteran who boasts a record of 42-7 with 29 knockouts, was incensed at being kept out of the press conference until Garcia was finished.
“This is crazy, insane,” he said when his turn came. “They’re trying to make me look like some savage or something . . . Why? Because of Danny Garcia and his crew’s insecurities? It’s not right.”
Judah reinvigorated his career in March of last year with a ninthround technical knockout of Vernon Paris in a non-title bout.
That came eight months after Britain’s Amir Khan delivered a dominating fifth-round knockout of Judah on July 23, 2011.
Garcia beat Mexico’s Erik Morales with a unanimous 12-round decision in March of 2012 to claim the WBC crown, then took the WBA from Khan with a fourth-round stoppage last July.
In November, Garcia knocked out Morales in the fourth round in a rematch in the first boxing card at Brooklyn’s new Barclays Center, the venue for Saturday’s fight.