Victorville’s Ryan Garcia (18-0, 15 KOs) stepped on the scales Friday afternoon before clashing with Avery Sparrow in Carson on Saturday night, but his opponent was nowhere to be found.
“I just want to know where [Sparrow] is at. He’s been talking a lot and I don’t see him here, ”Garcia said shortly after successfully reaching the 135 pound weight limit. “I just wanted this fight. Someone calls him. Somebody called him. Let’s fight. Let’s do it. “
Sparrow was out of the building and nowhere to fight because he was arrested by U.S. Marshals on Friday afternoon hours before their Mexican Independence Day weekend clash at Dignity Health Sports Park.
Philadelphia-based Sparrow had a warrant for an April domestic argument in which he allegedly brandished a gun after a woman threw his clothes out of a window.
Sparrow was unaware that he was in legal trouble until he landed in Los Angeles for his fight on Tuesday. According to Sparrow’s Philadelphia-based promoter Russel Peltz, Sparrow was never served a home arrest warrant because he did not live at an address.
Sparrow, 25, ran near his Los Angeles hotel on Friday morning. Members of his team wanted to shed the last few pounds to be lightweight at the 1pm weigh-in.
Then the police followed him, said Peltz.
Shortly thereafter, Sparrow and his entourage got into their vehicles and drove to a nearby destination. After they left the store, they were surrounded by police officers and a helicopter circled overhead. Sparrow was arrested and taken to the men’s central prison.
“You might as well have thought you shot the president,” Peltz told the Los Angeles Times shortly after the incident. “I saw the video in April and told him to watch who he was hanging out with. … I thought I had seen it all in my 50 years in boxing. Dealing with something like this is a first for me. Outside of Avery, no one is sicker than me. “
Peltz said he learned this week from a Philadelphia detective and supervisor who was handling the case that Sparrow could fight on Saturday on condition that he had his career wallet in hand until he was in front of a judge on Monday Philadelphia turned up a court hearing.
“We were first informed this week that Russell has a potential problem. He told us everything was fine, Avery would fight for working something with the Philadelphia District Attorney. He was suddenly arrested today, which is a major blow, “Golden Boy president Eric Gomez told The Times. “We notified Ryan’s team and told him about backup Romero Duno, who is also fighting on Saturday. Ryan’s team is currently unwilling to fight Duno for some reason. We try to come up with someone else or other ideas. “
Duno, a Filipino fighter Garcia has been calling for a November 2nd bout on social media since August and yesterday during a press conference, is also fighting on the map on Saturday, at the same weight limit, and could be an optimal last-minute switch Garcia should agree.
Gomez said Team Garcia claimed Duno was “a tough opponent who can be reached around the clock without proper preparation”.
Garcia countered on Twitter and said: “My trainer Eddy [Reynoso] never said that! “
Avery Sparrow (left) fights Isaelin Florian in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania in June 2017.
(Getty Images)
Garcia then went to Twitter with a tirade of displeasure with Golden Boy, similar to the past, and said, “You will do whatever you can to blame me! Little did I know Avery had an arrest warrant! He was arrested!
“The bottom line is, I deserve the right promotion for full-time bouts to promote and not get involved in a fight, and let me do the entire promotion knowing my fan base will definitely tune in “Garcia tweeted at the time.
The mood was the same again on Friday after Garcia and Golden Boy CEO and Chairman Oscar De La Hoya assured The Times that there was no argument between them.
“A fighter’s relationship with his promoter will always be like a marriage. You’re never happy all the time, but when you are, things are amazing, ”De La Hoya told The Times on Thursday. “You hiccup here and there, but everything is great [with Ryan]. We want the best for him and get him what he wants.
Gomez and Golden Boy do their best to find Garcia as a suitable opponent.
“He’s a young man. We want the best for him. Whenever something like this happens at the last minute, we grab straws and try to fix it as best we can. We can only offer him ideas. It’s up to him to decide whether or not to accept the challenge, ”said Gomez.
“He has his advisors [Guadalupe Valencia] that is age and experience. We don’t deal with Ryan directly, but we are in constant contact with his team. It would be a shame if Ryan didn’t fight. We hope to find a solution, save the fight and then deal with it accordingly. It could be Saturday noon before we pull the plug, I don’t know. There is no rule or deadline. “
The rest of the fight card will take place at Dignity Health Sports Park on Saturday and streamed on DAZN, highlighted by undefeated Mexican star Jaime Munguia versus Patrick Allotey.
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