{"id":680365,"date":"2026-05-19T07:55:17","date_gmt":"2026-05-19T07:55:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/680365\/"},"modified":"2026-05-19T07:55:17","modified_gmt":"2026-05-19T07:55:17","slug":"new-wbc-champion-ryan-garcia-ready-to-become-face-of-boxing","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/680365\/","title":{"rendered":"New WBC Champion Ryan Garcia ready to become \u2018face of boxing\u2019"},"content":{"rendered":"

Fresh off winning<\/a> his first major world title, the WBC welterweight belt, Ryan Garcia believes he finally has everything he needs to become the face of boxing, but he\u2019s not ready to claim that lofty title just yet.<\/p>\n

Garcia appeared on ESPN\u2019s First Take<\/a> with Stephen A. Smith this week to talk about his future, potential fights with Conor Benn and Devin Haney, and what winning a world championship means for his ambitions.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

After winning the WBC welterweight belt over Mario Barrios in February, California native Ryan Garcia believes he\u2019s ready to take the next step and become the \u2018face of boxing.\u2019 Getty Images<\/p>\n

When Smith asked whether Garcia still sees himself as someone capable of being sweet science\u2019s public ambassador despite fighting just three times in the past three years, Garcia pointed to the belt as the missing piece.<\/p>\n

\u201cWell, you know, now that I\u2019m a world champion and I have the belt, I feel like I\u2019ve always had the following and all the opportunities you can have as a superstar,\u201d Garcia said. \u201cNow that I have this piece that I was kind of missing, of course I would love to keep fighting, carry boxing, and lead this generation of young fighters in popularity and now as a world champion.\u201d<\/p>\n

He was quick to add that talk is cheap from here. \u201cI have all the opportunities to become the face of boxing, but now I just have to prove it with my dedication and all the fights that are going to be lined up. I have to do it now.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

After winning the WBC welterweight belt over Mario Barrios in February, California native Ryan Garcia believes he\u2019s ready to take the next step and become the \u2018face of boxing.\u2019 Getty Images<\/p>\n

In 2024 Garcia has tested positive <\/a>for osterine, a banned performance enhancing substance and was subsequently banned from competition. Shortly after his PED suspension, Garcia sparked<\/a> major outrage during a livestream on X where he used racial slurs against Black people and made disparaging comments about Muslims and other groups. He was reinstated by the WBC in November of 2025.<\/p>\n

During the interview, Garcia also confirmed interest in a title defense against Benn and called a Haney rematch \u201cthe only fight that would make sense\u201d after that.<\/p>\n

On his 2023 loss to Gervonta Davis, Garcia pushed back on any narrative that it defined him, arguing he took the fight when other top fighters were ducking big matchups to protect their records. Garcia said a rematch with Davis would only happen on \u201ceven terms\u201d now that he\u2019s champion.<\/p>\n

He didn\u2019t exactly extend a friendly offer to Davis. \u201cI\u2019m a world champion now. What has he been doing? Why are we talking about him? He hasn\u2019t been doing nothing.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Fresh off winning his first major world title, the WBC welterweight belt, Ryan Garcia believes he finally has…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":680366,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[571],"tags":[64,63,802,30027,64839,2767,37653,85,41711,328148,2086],"class_list":["post-680365","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-boxing","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-boxing","tag-conor-benn","tag-devin-haney","tag-mario-barrios","tag-ryan-garcia","tag-sports","tag-stephen-a-smith","tag-wbc-welterweight","tag-world-championship"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/680365","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=680365"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/680365\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/680366"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=680365"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=680365"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=680365"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}