{"id":906444,"date":"2026-09-26T17:24:14","date_gmt":"2026-09-26T17:24:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/906444\/"},"modified":"2026-09-26T17:24:14","modified_gmt":"2026-09-26T17:24:14","slug":"teddy-atlas-picks-a-winner-in-ryan-garcia-vs-isaac-cruz-hell-have-a-lot-of-chances-to-catch-him","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/906444\/","title":{"rendered":"Teddy Atlas picks a winner in Ryan Garcia vs Isaac Cruz: “He’ll have a lot of chances to catch him”"},"content":{"rendered":"

Hall of Fame trainer and analyst Teddy Atlas would favour one man in a \u201cbig way\u201d if Ryan Garcia<\/a> ends up facing Isaac \u2018Pitbull\u2019 Cruz.<\/p>\n

The American successfully defended his WBC title earlier this month, flooring Conor Benn with a right hand and ultimately stopping his man in round two<\/a>.<\/p>\n

In doing so, Garcia retained his status as a world welterweight champion after dethroning Mario Barrios with a unanimous decision victory<\/a> in February.<\/p>\n

Prior to that, he looked far less impressive while getting outpointed by Rolando Romero, with his second professional defeat arriving at the completion of a year-long doping ban.<\/p>\n

Based on his latest performance, however, Garcia appears to be fighting with supreme confidence as he targets another outing in 2026.<\/p>\n

Standing in the opposite corner, he hopes, will be super-lightweight contender Cruz, who scored a sixth-round knockout over Nestor Bravo last weekend.<\/p>\n

For all the Mexican\u2019s strength and tenacity, though, Atlas has said on his YouTube channel<\/a> that Garcia \u2013 who is around 6in taller \u2013 would surely punish Pitbull with his long-range attacks.<\/p>\n

\u201cWith [Garcia\u2019s] style on the outside and the sharpness of [his] punches \u2013 the right hand and the left hook \u2013 he\u2019s going to have a lot of chances to catch [Cruz] just like he caught Benn.<\/p>\n

\u201cCruz has a good chin \u2013 he\u2019s a gutsy guy. And he\u2019s a little more clever than he might have looked [against Bravo]. He\u2019ll move his head, he\u2019ll do certain things \u2026 he can even use his jab, at times.<\/p>\n

\u201cBut, at the end of the day, you gotta favour Garcia in a big way. Is it a step too far [for Cruz] as far as size [is concerned]?\u201d<\/p>\n

While having campaigned at 140lbs for his last six fights, Cruz is, indeed, a much naturally smaller man than Garcia, who appears to have found an appropriate home at 147lbs.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Hall of Fame trainer and analyst Teddy Atlas would favour one man in a \u201cbig way\u201d if Ryan…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":906445,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[571],"tags":[64,63,802,85],"class_list":["post-906444","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-boxing","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-boxing","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/906444","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=906444"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/906444\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/906445"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=906444"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=906444"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=906444"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}