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Hector Garcia will enter the ring Saturday night in Las Vegas as an unknown underdog.
Based on what he has seen, however, the undefeated Dominican southpaw suspects that Chris Colbert won’t serve as quite the steep step up in class most fans and media consider Colbert for him. Garcia, who works with respected Cuban trainer Ismael Salas, stayed in the gym and remained in shape, thus he wasn’t concerned about taking their 12-round, 130-pound fight on 2½ weeks’ notice.
“I don’t think he’s gonna be trouble for me at all. I’m not concerned,” Garcia told BoxingScene.com. “I’ve been sparring with other fighters that have been emulating what he does inside the ring. And I believe that I’m gonna have the answers to what he brings. The things I’m gonna have to look out for will be the fact that he likes to literally put his best hand forward, and then that he’s very agile, he’s quick on his feet. But besides that, I’ll be ready for anything that he can provide inside the ring.”
The winner between Brooklyn’s Colbert (16-0, 6 KOs) and Garcia (14-0, 10 KOs, 3 NC) is expected to challenge Venezuela’s Roger Gutierrez in his following fight for the WBA world super featherweight title. Gutierrez (26-3-1, 20 KOs) was Colbert’s original opponent for the main event of this “Showtime Championship Boxing” tripleheader, but he contracted COVID-19 while training and withdrew from it earlier this month.
Garcia, 30, out-boxed Mexican southpaw Isaac Avelar (16-4, 10 KOs) in his most recent fight, an eight-rounder he won by unanimous decision December 18 at The Armory in Minneapolis.
“The fight against Avelar was a really good one,” said Garcia, who has boxed beyond the sixth round just twice in five years as a pro. “That fight opened this door for me. So, now, I’ve gotta come busting through this door and make sure I make the most of this opportunity, which will, in turn, open up even more doors for me if I do what I know I can do.”
Colbert beat Mongolia’s Tugstsogt Nyambayar (12-2-1, 9 KOs) by unanimous decision when he last fought, July 3 at Dignity Health Sports Park in Carson, California. The 25-year-old Colbert won that 12-round, 130-pound fight for the WBA interim super featherweight title Colbert then held convincingly on all three scorecards (118-110, 118-110 and 117-111).
“Granted, the fact that I haven’t faced him yet makes it very intriguing,” Garcia said. “But the fact that I have been able to train with sparring partners that fight in a similar way to him makes me think that it’s not gonna be that hard for me and the jump isn’t gonna be that steep.”
The Colbert-Garcia fight will be immediately preceded by a 10-round co-feature in which junior welterweight Gary Antuanne Russell (14-0, 14 KOs), of Capitol Heights, Maryland, will face the most accomplished opponent of his career in Ukraine’s Viktor Postol (31-3, 12 KOs), a former WBC super lightweight champion. Showtime’s tripleheader is set to begin at 10 p.m. ET, when the Philippines’ Jerwin Ancajas (33-1-2, 22 KOs) will defend his IBF junior bantamweight title against Argentina’s Fernando Daniel Martinez (13-0, 8 KOs), Ancajas’ mandatory challenger, in a 12-rounder.
Keith Idec is a senior writer/columnist for BoxingScene.com. He can be reached on Twitter @Idecboxing.