Bill Haney is confident that a rematch between Devin and Ryan Garcia will still happen despite dropping the lawsuit they have over his positive PED test for the banned substance Ostarine from their fight eight months ago on April 20th.
The people decide
According to Bill, the people will decide if there is a Devin vs. Garcia rematch is, and they want to see it. So, if they want to see it, the networks will make it happen. The lawsuit stands. They won’t let it go.
Garcia (24-1, 20 KOs) appears to be interested in a rematch and frequently jokes about wanting to knock Haney down more with his left hook. The only thing that could stand in the way of a second fight is if Devin fights someone else.
Bill feels Devin has proven himself as a world champion and can fight anyone he wants. However, he hasn’t done so since losing to Garcia, suggesting he is waiting for his one-year suspension to end in April 2025 in hopes of getting a rematch.
Bill is reticent about his desire for the second fight to happen immediately, but he’s easy to read. You can tell from the way he talks that the Garcia rematch is the ONLY fight he and Devin want.
“Devin is a champion. Ryan Garcia is not. Oscar De La Hoya has yet to make a champion out of Ryan Garcia,” said Bill Haney. Fight Hub TV when asked if the lawsuit they have against Ryan will affect their ability to get a rematch.
“Devin wants to fight who the people want to see, but he wants it to be on a level playing field. We do it for the people. They’re the ones paying the bills, not the promoters,” Bill said about why they want a rematch with Ryan.
“If the fans want to see a fight, then there is a network that wants to put it on. Gone are the days when Oscar De La Hoya said what he wanted. He said there’s no need for a rematch, but that’s him not listening to the people. He is the one creating false narratives as if the people are not asking for it,” said Bill.
Garcia’s victory dismissed
It’s a mistake for Haney to sit out of the ring with Ryan without fighting anyone and for his father, Bill, to regularly talk about the positive test. If Bill believes that by mentioning this he is erasing the memory that fans have lost of Devin, he is wasting his time.
The New York State Athletic Commission expunged Haney’s loss to Garcia and changed it to a no-contest because of his positive test for Ostarine. But Bill can’t erase the image of Ryan defeating his son from the fans’ memories by citing positive tests 24/7. It’s not going to work. He can’t whitewash what happened by constantly dredging it up in every interview and mentioning it on social media.
It just makes Bill and Devin look like serious losers because fans don’t believe that Ryan won because of Ostarine. They just think Haney has a glass chin, can’t punch, and was never that good in the first place.
“The biggest thing is drug testing,” Bill said when asked if deciding what weight would be the biggest thing that would have to be decided for a rematch between Devin and Ryan. “He said he was crazy. So, if you were crazy enough to do it the first time, then you’ll be crazy enough to do it a second time. That’s the catch, that he signs up for a (drug testing) program.
“You put something on the table where you would be the A side and we the B side would be an insult. They knew it was an insult,” Bill Haney said of Bob Arum making an offer for Devin to fight Teofimo Lopez.
