When asked directly if Barrios brings any challenge he hasn’t faced yet, Garcia gave a one-word answer.
“Absolutely not.”
That answer stood out because Garcia was trying to win a world welterweight title for the first time, against a champion who earned his position through durability and consistent pressure.
A fighter moving up usually shows some caution, especially when stepping into a new weight and dealing with a man who knows how to handle twelve hard rounds without getting winded. Barrios just went the distance with Manny Pacquiao, keeping his feet under him, letting his hands go in spots and proving he can keep a championship pace against top level fighters.
Look past the champion
Garcia’s tone says he sees Barrios as a style to solve, not a man who can shift his ways. He kept the talk on his own camp, his own hands, his own conditioning, without pointing to any particular wrinkle the champion brings that could suppress his chin or disrupt his rhythm.
“I just don’t think he’s going to be able to expect these hits from anywhere,” Garcia said. “I just don’t think he will be able to handle my speed.”
Garcia described his training camp as a period of renewed discipline and said he fully committed himself to physical and mental preparation.
“I really rededicated myself to being as on point as possible from diet to discipline, from everything I had to sacrifice,” Garcia said. “You’re going to see the sharpest I’ve ever been.”
His language changed noticeably when the subject shifted to Shakur Stevenson. Speaking with greater intensity and conviction, Garcia described Stevenson not as a future opponent but as a rival whose reputation he intends to tear down.
“I just think that everybody thinks he’s a savant in the ring, and I’m just here to take that away,” Garcia said. “I’ll beat him in the amateurs, I’ll beat him again, and I’ll hurt him. I’ll humiliate him in a way he’s never been humiliated before.”
That break in tone told you how Garcia was piling it up in his own head. The Barrios talk sounded like standard camp business, sharpening tools and getting rounds in. The Stevenson talk carried sharp, like a fight he feels in his chest, not just one he squeezes into the calendar.
Garcia enters the Barrios fight looking to capture his first world welterweight title, but his confidence suggests he sees the championship as a stepping stone rather than a final proving ground. His willingness to publicly dismiss the champion while directing his strongest language at another fighter shows he already sees himself beyond the immediate task before him.
