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Joe Rogan Derails Ryan Garcia’s Public Bashing With a No-Joke Statement on Devin Haney Fight

Published 05/07/2024, 11:04 AM EDT

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It was a pure spectacle when Max Holloway knocked out Justin Gaethje to win the UFC BMF championship at UFC 300. The fight lived up to every expectation and even UFC President, Dana White agreed, “That fight sucked the life out of everybody tonight.” The 20,000+ people in the venue were stunned by Holloway’s performance in the bout’s final moments. While it’s normal for experts to pick a favorite before a fight, according to the 56-year-old JRE host, predicting the outcome is impossible. Speaking to Holloway in the #155 episode of the JRE MMA Show, Rogan pointed out the same thing.

Joe Rogan said, “There’s all these people that have these takes where they know what’s going to happen. It’s such a stupid thing to do. You don’t know what’s gonna happen. You can talk about someone’s strength. It’s just dumb. You know you should talk about someone’s skills and what they can do, and this could be a factor and that could be a factor.”

Current BMF champion Holloway also seemed to agree with the claims. The 32-year-old pointed out the fact as to how he was literally counted out before his fight against Justin Gaethje. That’s when Joe Rogan mentioned how the critics had written off Ryan Garcia before his fight against Devin Haney on April 20.  Adding to claims, Rogan said, “That’s a stupid way to look at things. There’s not a chance in hell you know when two world-class martial artists fight. I saw a lot of people doing that this fight the past weekend with Devin Haney-Ryan Garcia. Everybody was counting out Ryan Garcia. So many people. “

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But, 25-year-old Ryan Garcia surprised everyone with his performance against ‘The Dream’, and he did that after some sources declared him an underdog and Haney as a favorite. During his dominating performance, he dropped the super lightweight champion three times and handed Haney his first professional defeat.

It must be noted that even when Colby Covington met Ryan Garcia in Florida after defeating Haney, the 25-year-old was spotted demonstrating his skills to Covington and showed him how to land a hook to the body or the head and keep the opponent guessing about the next move. Garcia showed off his left hook in the 40-second video he uploaded on X but later deleted it.

The build-up to the fight against Haney had everyone doubting Garcia’s mental state because of his social media antics and seemingly intentional weight miss. So it was not surprising to see the bets favoring Haney. But there was one person who believed Garcia could do it and even provided him with some advice before the match. The three-weight world champion, Shane Mosley told him that he had poor footwork so he had to work on it.

Mosley said, “This fight is going to come down to how good your footwork is. That doesn’t mean moving away from him. It means being explosive front and back, side to side to land your power punches… You are quicker than him (Haney), but his feet might be a little quicker. Work on that fast twitch muscle you will be happy.” And the real surprise was how loudly Garcia showed up on fight night. Looks like Garcia listened to Mosley and beat Haney.

However, the tables have once again turned on the boxing sensation after a positive PED test, which begs the question of how Rogan will respond to this situation.

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Will Rogan support Ryan Garcia after his positive PED test?

This is also not the first time Rogan has come to the defense of the 25-year-old. Garcia, in his last fight, suffered a defeat against Gervonta Davis. While he faced criticism for the way he lost, from most Rogan once again stood by him.

When Ryan Garcia took on Gervonta Davis last year, many felt that the battle was a mismatch. Experts felt that the power of ‘Tank’ would be too much for ‘King Ry’ to handle. This is what exactly happened when the 25-year-old lost the battle because of a powerful body shot in the seventh round. What followed was a series of criticisms against Garcia and his boxing credentials. However, Rogan supported the 25-year-old and analyzed the fight in his #139 episode of JRE MMA show.

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Rogan invited UFC legend Bas Rutten to his show and cleared the fact as to how liver shots are the most impactful. He said, “The liver’s awful,”. He further added how most fans criticized Garcia for giving up in the fight and advised them to get into the ring once. Rogan said, “O My God! People were saying when Ryan Garcia went down against Tank Davis, and people saying like he quit. Like, have you ever been hit there before?” 

But how will Rogan react to the recent positive PED test news? According to reports, Garcia tested positive for Ostarine in samples taken on the day before the fight and on fight day. Rogan has been around the sports long enough and takes hormone replacement therapy himself to know enough to comment on the issue. Will he wash his hands of the support for Garcia like Conor McGregor did? Let us know in the comments.

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Written by:

Anirban Chatterjee

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One take at a time

Anirban Chatterjee is a UFC writer at EssentiallySports. He holds an MBA in Sports Management and is an athlete himself. After stints in notable organizations as a professional writer, Anirban pivoted to covering UFC, ONE Championship, and other premier MMA promotions.
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Edited by:

Yeswanth Praveen