Danny Garcia (34-2, 20 KO) faces Adrian Granados (20-6-2, 14 KO) in Saturday’s PBC on FOX main event, and chatted with Marcos Villegas about changes i his training camp, making weight, possibly moving to 154, “hater” Shawn Porter, and Crawford-Khan.
On adding a new strength & conditioning coach
“I felt like I just needed to get a little bit stronger. I didn’t like how my body looked in my last few fights. My body wasn’t cut up and strong as it usually looked. I felt like I just needed a change. We worked on different things, different muscles, more explosive stuff. I felt like my body feels a lot stronger now. ... I feel like I built more muscle, too, that’s why it was a little bit harder for me to lose the weight. But I definitely feel strong.”
On how hard it is getting older and cutting weight
“On a scale of one to 10, that shit’s, like, a nine. 140 was a 10. When I fought 140, that was a 10. This is a nine, just because I got seven more pounds. ... These last three days I’ve been eating real light. I usually eat small portions of food, small piece of fish, some carrots, that’s it. Yesterday I ate an orange and drank a half a cup of coffee and I gained a pound. I was, like, fuck! Now I gotta run 20 or 30 minutes on a treadmill to get that shit off.”
On where he’s at right now, weight-wise
“Right now I’m at 149. I’m gonna go to the gym, work out, and get to 147 so I can eat tonight. I’m gonna eat, like, two pounds of food. I’ll just spit in the morning or something, I’ll be 147 on the dot.”
On how much longer he’ll be at 147
“Two more big fights. Two more good fights, and then I’m going to 154. If you really think about it, of course I gotta get this victory on Saturday. There’s only a couple more people for me to fight at 147, and if I don’t fight them at 147, I can fight them at 154, because they’re obviously gonna move up one day. Porter and Thurman, I already fought them. So, what, it’s a Pacquiao or a Spence fight, those are probably the only other two fights at 147. Or I could rematch Porter or Thurman, but I think those could be fights at 154 one day. So two more fights after this.”
On facing Charlo, Hurd or Lara at 154
“Man, Charlo and Hurd are too damn big. They should be at 160. They big dudes, man! I’m cool, I’ll fight somebody else. Nah, I’ll fight anybody. If they ask if I wanna fight those guys for the belt, I’ll go up and fight them, but that’s not my plan.”
On Crawford vs Khan
“Skill-wise, I think it’s a good fight. People are only interested in how long Khan’s gonna last, because he obviously can’t take a good punch. This is not a secret. But he’s good at fighting southpaws. Like, he destroyed Zab Judah, Devon Alexander he made easy work. I don’t think Crawford’s southpaw style will be an advantage. I think that’s been a key in his career. I think Crawford’s gonna be more right-handed this fight. I think it’s a 50-50 fight until a good shot lands. Khan has the style to beat him — hit him, move. But we’ll have to see.”
On fighting Terence Crawford
“You have to be good at fighting southpaws, because you’ve been fighting right-handers your whole career. You know what to do against them. If you can fight a southpaw good, you should be able to adjust, easily.”
On whether he wants to face Crawford
“If the money’s right, I’ll fight anybody. But that’s on the other side, that’s Top Rank. That’d be an issue. Are we gonna fight on FOX, are we gonna fight on ESPN? The fight could happen. That’s what Al Haymon and Bob Arum gotta get together and get the money right and make the fight happen.”
On calling Shawn Porter “a hater” for saying Granados was tougher than Garcia
“The majority of the world seen me beat (Porter). (Granados) won, like, two rounds against Porter, two or three rounds. Come on, man. You’re just saying that because you don’t like me. I got more money than you, you mad.”