Is Ryan Garcia sabotaging Romero?

Ryan Garcia is said to have chosen Rolly Romero as his opponent for May 2nd in Times Square, New York. It’s surprising to fans that Garcia handpicked Rolly (16-2, 13 KOs) because he doesn’t like him much and was recently knocked out last year.

Garcia vs. Romero will be the main event on Turki Al-Sheikh’s May 2 card. Devin Haney will fight Jose Ramirez in the main support bout. It should be a flip-flop, with Haney-Ramírez in the headline spot and Garcia-Romero as the main event. Ryan is more popular than Devin because of his 12 million Instagram followers, which is why he’s in first place against Romero.

Boxing fans will give Ryan a pass to use Rolly as a PPV matchup because his next fight will be a rematch with Devin Haney in October. So, they’re going to hold off on Garcia taking the Rolly Romero tomato can because he’s going to fight Devin next.

Will Garcia regret it?

Garcia is counting on Rolly to draw interest in his fight with his ability to trash talk outside the ring. This is the main thing that Romero is good at. He’s a limited fighter, but he connects with fans with quirky interviews.

Still, he has done so poorly in his fights and hasn’t looked good in a fight in years. He was knocked out by Pitbull Cruz last March and has underperformed in fights against Ismael Barro, Manuel Jaimes, Gervonta Davis and Jackson Marinez.

Initially, there were talks between Garcia (24-1, 20 KOs) and Isaac ‘Pitbull’ Cruz. However, he chose not to fight because he was scheduled to fight Angel Fierro on February 1. Cruz wanted to wait.

So Ryan went with Romero, 29, as his opponent. Pitbull choosing not to fight Garcia is what messed things up. But even with him choosing not to take the match with Kingry, he could have found a better opponent than Rolly.

Ryan’s promoter, Oscar De La Hoya, was interested in Teofimo Lopez as his opponent, but went with Rolly.