In this video interview with FightHype, trainer Robert Garcia gives us his impressions on Adrien Broner and where he could possibly go from here after clearly losing to his brother on Saturday.
Garcia on how he would evaluate Broner compared to when he last faced him with Marcos Maidana:
"I think he was in shape. I think that he was probably the good Broner, not the one that's been fuckin' around. I think he got in great shape for this fight it's just that Mikey was too much better."
On where Broner goes now, after losing three big fights:
"Broner can still fight, man. People saying this do or die for him or this fight, if he loses, he's done. Why would he be done, man. He's still never been knocked out, he still gives everybody a great fight, it was over 12,000 people in the arena so, you know, he still has a following. He still sells so I think he can continue fighting. There's a lot of fighters out there that he could beat.
"140's good for him. He looked good, he fought strong, I think 140's good for him."
Now it's time for me to eat some crow...
I was one of the few who thought Broner would pull off an upset win here. I was wrong. And my pick wasn't even intended as any discredit towards Mikey Garcia. Mikey Garcia has been a proven fighter since before he took long hiatus from the sport to deal with promotional issues. That said, he hadn't been proven at this weight and I thought that would make a difference.
Adrien Broner didn't allow that to make a difference in this fight, though. He didn't play to his strengths and Mikey played to all of his. That's why Mikey is clearly the better fighter.
I also didn't pick Broner to win because I thought he would let his hands fly all of the sudden, either. But I did think Broner would come out to press his size and strength advantages and look to get in some exchanges on the inside were he could exploit his hand speed.
But instead, from the opening round, Broner came out and fought like the smaller man who was at a power deficit. He moved around a lot, after every punch he threw, playing keep away from Garcia. I even thought he won the opening round, but it just wasn't a sustainable strategy. And to Garcia's credit, he really made Broner uncomfortable with the way he stood his ground, keeping his positioning when Broner let anything go. Garcia wasn't backing off or showing any signs of intimidation at the incoming fire, and I think that really got in Broner's head.
Ironically enough, even Broner's trainer yelled at him at one point in the second half for being so skittish and fighting like the smaller man. And if you watch the fight again you'll see Broner actually had his best success when he was pressed on that issue and then tried walking Garcia down to unleash combination punches. But that came far too late and far too seldom against an opponent of Garcia's caliber.
It's now hard to envision any scenario where Broner will become the PPV star he always claimed to be, but there are decent fighters out there that Broner could in fact beat. I wouldn't even be surprised for him to win another world title at some point considering this era of boxing we live in. But he has proven himself not to be an elite fighter and if his psyche can handle that without crumbling, there's still some good money for Broner to make as a top-level gatekeeper.