Former interim boxing world champion Ryan Garcia’s upcoming fight against unbeaten WBC super lightweight champion Devin Haney is set to be one of the biggest bouts of the year, but debate is raging as to whether it should go ahead at all.
The 25-year-old pair faced off six times as amateurs – the most recent coming when they were 16 – and split three wins apiece.
31-0 Haney is the former undisputed lightweight world champion and one of the pound-for-pound best boxers in the world, while Garcia’s loss to Gervonta Davis in April 2023 was hugely popular, with a sellout Vegas crowd delivering $22.8m USD in ticket sales (the fifth highest in Vegas history) and over 1.2 million pay-per-view buys in the USA alone.
The upcoming April 20 bout, then, should be one of boxing’s biggest drawcards on the 2024 calendar.
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But behind the hype is an alarming truth: Garcia is seemingly in crisis, a star who has previously been praised for taking time off for mental health reasons now seemingly caught in a far more worrying situation.
Aliens, Tupac’s killer, Satanic rivals, rape and child trafficking: these are just some of the bizarre topics that Garcia has ranted about in recent weeks.
For weeks, the American has launched a Donald Trump-esque torrent of outlandish and often defamatory claims across a variety of social media platforms, raising widespread concerns over his mental health ahead of the bout.
It is hard to summarise the full gamut of Garcia’s concerning recent actions.
In the last couple of weeks alone, Garcia has claimed he was raped as a two-year old by a family member; claimed he was kidnapped at Bohemian Grove (a secretive camp in California, USA) by ‘the elites’ and forced to watch children be sexually abused (and has proof of that and other child sex trafficking); claimed he is a god; claimed influencer Logan Paul worships Satan and that his Prime energy drink includes cyanide – and challenged his brother Jake Paul to a boxing bout; predicted an earthquake will “destroy” Los Angeles and Las Vegas on June 6; claims he has proof that aliens exist; claims he knows who killed rapper Tupac Shakur (and has proof); alleged that Tom Hanks and Oprah Winfrey were connected to convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein, claimed Haney’s father and trainer was a pimp; called billionaire Elon Musk “the Antichrist” … and much more, including releasing a rap song.
Garcia has offered no proof for any of his allegations.
The antics have crossed from social media posts to live streams on X (formerly Twitter) and Instagram featuring people such as divisive influencer Andrew Tate.
One social media post earlier this month also claimed that Garcia had been killed. A video posted to Garcia’s account was overlaid with text reading: “We got him boys. RYAN GARCIA RIP B***H. 666” and “MARCH 3 SUNDAY 2024 we slit RG THROAT”.
Another recent barrage of (now deleted) tweets said: “Tweets deleted in real-time. They planning my death now. April 12th, they will kill me. When [it] happens, will you believe then”?
Earlier, on Christmas Day, he split from wife Andrea Celina, two days after she gave birth to their second child. In January, he took to social media to announce his divorce and the birth of baby Henry Leo on the same day.
His ex-wife Celina has since come out expressing concern for Garcia’s wellbeing.
In an Instagram story on March 4, she said “I know in my heart he is being heavily oppressed. This is not a troll, [I’m] genuinely concerned and so is all his family members …
“We are not part of any of this and want him to get better but this is REAL. Pray for him.”
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Garcia the following day came out with a video captioned “clearing things up” – but his attempt to play down his concerning behaviour only raised more questions.
“Hey guys. It’s me, Ryan,” he said in the video. “I’m coming on here to explain what’s going on. I’m not in possession of my phone, I can’t get access to my Instagram, my cards are locked, and I’m just being real taken advantage (of).
“I want to personally just send out a video to the people that love me and my fans, family that’s concerned, that I’m okay.
“I’m not dead, I believe in Jesus. All those are lies and, you know … They tried to put me in jail, they’re blocking my cards, I can’t access my money, nobody’s hitting me back. I don’t know what’s going on but just know I’m okay. Love.”
If that was meant to reassure fans of his mental wellbeing, it did the opposite. Fans reached out on social media to Garcia’s coach and father, who replied to one saying: “Yes Ryan is OK, he’s just trolling the wrong way.”
Few believe that.
If it is trolling – something Garcia has claimed – then it has been taken to extremes, and the defamatory nature of many of his allegations could see him facing a number of legal cases.
In person, Garcia’s antics and mannerisms have also been painted an ugly, concerning picture.
On February 29, Garcia showed up late by an hour to a press conference in LA promoting his fight with Haney. He attempted to convince someone in the audience to fight him on the spot, and was accused of using cocaine by Haney.
“Stop the coke, it’s f***ing up your voice,” Haney said.
“I don’t do cocaine,” said Garcia, before offering to take a live drug test.
He added: “I drink and I smoke weed. And so has the majority of this room.”
Garcia has since admitted to being high in an interview and has said he regularly gets drunk.
When he should be training his hardest for arguably the biggest fight of his career to date, that in itself is a worrying admission.
After becoming WBC interim lightweight champion in January 2021, Garcia shocked the boxing world by stepping away to focus on his mental health – not fighting again until beating Emmanuel Tagoe in April 2022.
He said later that he had experienced “suicidal thoughts”.
Many fighters have struggled with mental health issues, and Garcia drew widespread praise for the way he opened up on his challenges and prioritised his wellbeing.
Now, however, Garcia’s extremely erratic behaviour appears to indicate that he is again struggling with his wellbeing – as backed up by ex-wife Andrea Celina’s statement that she is “genuinely concerned and so is all his family members”.
Haney’s promoter Eddie Hearn also raised concerns about Garcia’s actions.
“He just didn’t seem himself at the presser, if I am honest,” Hearn said. “I think that I have been around a lot of people and a lot of fighters that I have seen go through problems and I have never been wrong when I’ve thought to myself ‘this person has got an issue here’ … I think that I can see it in Ryan too, and I do worry.
“I just noticed mannerisms around them, and this was nothing to do with substances, but you just see something changing mentally and emotionally in their behaviour.”
“Forget about the fight, I hope that he makes the fight, but he really needs to get into training camp.
“I’m worried about the people that he has got around him, he’s not even my responsibility, but what I have seen in the last few days and obviously what came last night, is erratic behaviour and erratic behaviour stems from something.”
He added: “We never know the truth because, from the outset, it doesn’t look good … He needs to go in that ring 100%, and if he’s not 100%, he shouldn’t fight.”
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Influencer Mike Majlak recently echoed those concerns, claiming that he has repeatedly discussed Garcia’s mental health with the boxer and declaring the fighter “needs help”.
Majlak entered a live chat on social media hosted by Garcia and interrupted a Garcia conspiracy theory rant about the Vatican, calling on the boxer to seek help. Garcia kicked him out of the chat and subsequently said: “He’s trying to spin the narrative that I need help, that I’m going through a manic episode.
“Bro, s*** my d***, you are on meth, relax. I don’t do meth and I don’t do cocaine, idiot.”
Garcia also posted this week in regards to Majlak, Jake Paul and another influencer-turned boxer KSI: “They are trying to spin the narrative that I’m going through something, they are working for the devil.”
KSI had written on social media: “Cancel the Ryan Garcia fight and actually get him some help.”
“It’s sad watching him have a mental breakdown publicly like this.”
KSI is far from the only figure in the boxing world to call for the fight to be cancelled over Garcia’s seeming mental health concerns.
A former three-weight world champion, Duke McKenzie, believes he is “not in any fit state to fight”.
McKenzie told talkSPORT: “They should pull him out. Somebody should pull him out. Somebody should say to him, ‘Ryan, you’re not in any fit state to fight right now’.
“It’s not too late. You can schedule a fight three months, six months, however long it takes for this boy to get right in his own mind because he’s clearly not.
“It’s not rocket science, he can get seriously and will get seriously hurt if this fight goes. I’m pretty sure of that.”
Five-decade veteran of boxing journalism, Kevine Iole, wrote: “Garcia is nowhere near being fit to fight.
“Garcia has a history of mental health issues and appears to be having a breakdown of some sort. His social media posts are bizarre and suggest a person who is fighting unseen demons. “He appears badly in need of medical assistance and not to be preparing to box one of the most talented fighters in the world in about five weeks.”
But so far, there has been no move to cancel the bout – and promoters are understandably wary of calling off a super-fight that will rake in tens of millions of dollars.
Garcia’s promoter Oscar De La Hoya said earlier this month: “Come April 20th, it’s going to be a bloodbath, it literally is.
“I’ve been in touch with Ryan Garcia. I spoke to him yesterday, and we FaceTimed each other. He looks good; he looks ready. All I know is he left for camp yesterday, and he’s with Derrick James, and he’s with his whole team.
“It’s all good. We will see Ryan Garcia up in the ring on April 20th.”
Haney himself wrote on X in a now-deleted post: “The fight is happening April 20th. he’s just playing crazy to “sell it” which is weird because it’s people who are actually crazy out there but he’s just acting for attention.”
The fight is sanctioned by the New York State Athletic Commission, who have the ability to order a mental health evaluation before allowing Garcia into the ring.
As Iole wrote: “The commission does have the ability to order a mental health examination, which would seem to be the very least that should be done at this point, five weeks from fight night … But it would be criminal to keep him in the fight the way he’s carrying himself.”
Garcia is far from the first fighter to battle mental health problems.
But one example stands out: when Oliver McCall in 1997 had a breakdown in the ring while fighting Lennox Lewis, erupting into floods of tears and refusing to fight. He would eventually be hospitalised for his mental health.
He was arguably lucky that he was not seriously injured in the ring that night.
If Garcia is not 100 per cent fit and fights Haney – one of the most dangerous boxers on the planet – he runs the risk of taking major punishment.
As McKenzie said: “It’s not rocket science, he can get seriously and will get seriously hurt if this fight goes. I’m pretty sure of that.”
Garcia drew plenty of plaudits for choosing to walk away from boxing in 2021 for his mental health.
This time, it appears others must make the choice for him. If they don’t, many fear boxing will have failed one of its most talented stars.