Danny Garcia, Brandon Rios, and The WBC's gentle extortion

Sub Lead17-Jan-18by John J. Raspanti

By Paul Magno

Garcia vs. Rios

How the hell did Danny Garcia vs. Brandon Rios on February 17 become a WBC eliminator for the second mandatory contender slot? And, while we’re at it, what the hell is a “second mandatory” contender, anyway?

Not too many people should have an issue with Garcia vs. Rios being made. It’s a fair enough match-up given the realities of both fighters’ careers. Garcia is coming off a tepid, timid loss to Keith Thurman last March and has not seemed even remotely interested in boxing up to his full potential since he outclassed Lucas Matthysse back in September of 2013. Garcia’s 6-1 run since the Matthysse fight could easily be 4-3 if he hadn’t gotten the benefit of the judges’ infinite mercy in his bouts with Mauricio Herrera and Lamont Peterson. Rios, meanwhile, looked to be absolutely shot in his one-sided blowout loss to Timothy Bradley in late 2015 and only moderately shot in his comeback bout KO of Aaron Herrera 19 months later.

Neither Garcia nor Rios are in a great spot, career-wise. Fighting each other seems like a perfect fit. Garcia needs a hard-fought (but not TOO hard) win against a “name" and Rios needs to take a gamble against a top ranked fighter who may be ripe for a humbling defeat. Not many writers are giving the battle-weary, but always intense Rios a fair shot at scoring the upset. Actually, as far as I can tell, only this writer has predicted a Rios upset. But, while it lasts, Garcia-Rios should be fun and nobody can begrudge either party for picking the other as an opponent.

The only really cynical part of this whole affair is the fact that the WBC has latched on to it.

Garcia vs. Rios

The Mexico City-based sanctioning body just couldn’t let a money making opportunity pass them by. Purse amounts are unknown at this point, but one can be sure that they’re going to be relatively substantial for a fight of this level, maybe in the conservative ballpark of $1.5 million, total. And, damn it, the WBC wants their 3% of that take.

In this deal, Rios gets an eliminator (of sorts) as the WBC’s #11 ranked welterweight, ahead of all the other ranked welterweights before him-- simply because he had signed on to fight #2 ranked Garcia.

It would be interesting to see the criteria on which the WBC welterweight rankings are put together because, honestly, like most of the alphabet soup rankings, they are an odd mess of strategically-placed patsies, faded money fighter, and the one or two true life contenders meant to actually go ahead and accomplish something. But that would be a topic for another day.

In the here and now, though, we have a meaningless eliminator status tagged to a fight that never needed it and a siphoning of 3% from both fighters’ purses that serves no purpose other than to fatten up the suits at the WBC.

So, why, if this is such a pointless and cynical cash grab by the WBC, are both fighters going along with it?

Well, because a well-past-his-prime Rios needs the WBC to fast track a title shot should he beat Garcia and Garcia, who should’ve been second in line to fight for Keith Thurman’s title, anyway, likely fears a loss of ranking should he reject the WBC’s kind offer to collect a sanctioning fee from him.

In boxing, this is called business; in polite society, it’s called borderline extortion.