Robert Garcia has found it unfortunate that his one-time client, Anthony Joshua, interpreted his criticism as a sign of disrespect.
Garcia briefly worked with London’s Joshua last year ahead of Joshua’s rematch with unified heavyweight champion Oleksandr Usyk in Saudi Arabia. Joshua acquitted himself well in the 12-round fight, particularly in a strong ninth round, but he came up short in the end, losing a decision for the second straight time to the Ukrainian.
After the fight, Garcia stirred up the peanut gallery with some comments he made that were baldly critical of Joshua. Among them, Garcia suggested that Joshua was mentally defeated by the 10th round.
It seemed Joshua never forgave Garcia for those remarks, as the Londoner decided to link up with veteran trainer Derrick James in preparation for his comeback fight with Jermaine Franklin earlier this month. Joshua handily outpointed Franklin over 12 rounds at O2 Arena in London.
Before the Franklin fight, Joshua revealed that he felt that his ex-trainer had crossed a line with some of his comments.
In a recent interview, Garcia stood by his original comments and justified his frankness as a commitment to improving his fighters.
“It sucks that he feels that way because if he wants a true answer, I think the trainer is the one that needs to tell him,” Garcia said of Joshua in an interview with iD Boxing. “He could be surrounded with nothing but yes-men. You know what, that’s fine. But the trainer has to be real to him. If the trainer is also a yes-man, then the trainer isn’t a real person. Then you’re fake. If you have nothing but yes-men around you, then you’re fake.
“Me as a trainer, I have that responsibility to say what I see and to be honest with him. When a fighter comes out saying, ‘Oh I didn’t like that comment that he made,’ then what do you expect me [to do]? I could be a yes-man and just go out there and get paid and not give a fuck. There are trainers like that. But I’m not one of them.”
In addition to the fight itself, Garcia thought Joshua’s conduct afterward was sorely wanting. Joshua famously sabotaged Usyk’s post-fight interview to go on an extended rant.
“After the fight, he totally lost control of his mind,” Garcia said of Joshua. “The way he acted was not right. I’m not the only one saying it. Everyone else was saying it.”
“I’m saying it (criticizing) to make you better,” Garcia continued. “If he took it personally, like I was talking sh!t. No! I was trying to motivate you to try to not allow that to happen. Hopefully that taught him a lesson.”
Still, Garcia feels gratified that Joshua decided to take his advice and move his training camp to America. Garcia believes Joshua’s partnership with new trainer James will pay off in the long run. James is best known for his work with unified welterweight champion Errol Spence Jr. and undisputed 154-pound champion Jermell Charlo.
“Derrick James at this moment is the best trainer in the world, trainer of the year, with guys like Charlo, who is an undisputed champion, and the other one in Spence, who could be undisputed in the next couple of months if he beats Crawford,” Garcia said. “F—, everybody wants to be with that trainer because that’s the trainer of the moment.
“He’s in great hands, in a great position. I know they’ll do good. Doing what I advised him to do, coming to the United States and getting a stay-busy tune-up fight is the best thing they did. And they did it. Not with me. But they did it.”