Ryan Garcia is open to the idea of throwing down with Sean O’Malley.
Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) Bantamweight champion, O’Malley, has made it clear he wants the biggest fights imaginable since he claimed the divisional throne in August 2023. The fight ideas haven’t been exclusive to mixed martial arts (MMA), however, as O’Malley’s expressed interest in some of today’s top boxers.
One of the names in mind is the multi-time boxing champion, Garcia (24-1), who has no problem going at it with “Sugar.” Even if that means doing so in the Octagon.
“I’ll beat his ass in MMA guaranteed,” Garcia said on The MMA Hour. “I’m a natural, you don’t understand. I’m a natural wrestler. I just beat my security that’s a wrestler, I beat him. I’m strong and I’ve got crazy conditioning.
“That’s already been done,” he continued. “I know I’m going to knock him out in boxing, that’s not even fair. What is fair is to test myself in MMA because I know if I put my mind to it and I trained every day, and I had Nate [Diaz] helping me, even Alex Pereira, all of them, and I really locked in, he will not beat me.
“I will come with everything I have and I will destroy Sean O’Malley. In the UFC,” Garcia concluded.
No matter what type of fight the pair were to have, it would need to be a collaborative effort, which means getting the promoters, Dana White and Oscar De La Hoya, to work together. The history has been colorful between the two, to say the least, but De La Hoya would be down to make it happen.
“I like him,” De La Hoya said of O’Malley on The MMA Hour. “He’s a good striker. It would be a hell of a promotion, right? I would actually entertain that because Ryan can fight in the main event with this kid and maybe I can do Dana on the co-main.
“Nah, we’re cool, it’s all good,” he continued. “I mean, I don’t know if we’re cool. I don’t even talk to the guy. I’m good, but it doesn’t mean that we can go at it [together].”
First things first for O’Malley, and that’s his first title defense in his rematch with Marlon “Chito” Vera at UFC 299 next weekend (Sat., March 9, 2024).