Ryan Garcia is no longer eligible to win the WBC Super Lightweight World Championship on Saturday night.
Stepping on the scale during Friday’s weigh-in, ‘King Ryan’ weighed in at 143.2 pounds, well over the 140-pound limit for his Brooklyn-based headliner with reigning titleholder Devin Haney.
However, the fight will move forward as scheduled, but Garcia cannot win the belt.
Throughout fight week, Haney repeatedly noted that Garcia looked heavy and suggested that his opponent would not make weight. On Thursday at a pre-fight press event, Garcia made a bet with Haney, stating that he would pay the champ $500,000 per pound if he didn’t hit the mark.
$500K on making weight
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“[Let’s bet] $500,000,” Garcia said, “$500,000.”
“Okay, that’s a bet,” Devin’s trainer and father Bill Haney replied. “If you don’t make weight, it’s $500,000.”
“It’s a bet,” Garcia responded.
Devin Haney then upped the ante, “$500,000 per pound [over the agreed weight]. Hey, Ryan. Let’s do $500,000 per pound. You wanna shake on it?”
According to longtime boxing reporter Dan Rafael on X, a financial agreement was reached to move ahead with the bout and Garcia will honor his handshake deal with Haney, forking over $1.5 million as a result of the massive weight miss.
The build-up to Ryan Garcia vs. Devin Haney has been littered with controversy
It’s just another bizarre moment in a build-up that has been riddled with crazy conspiracy theories, claims of drug abuse, club hopping, and marriage proposals to Aussie porn stars — and that’s just on Ryan Garcia’s side of things.
Earlier this week, Garcia and Haney got into a physical confrontation atop the Empire State Building in NYC which resulted in the duo being pulled from throwing out the first pitch at the Mets-Pirates game at Citi Field that same day.