By AJ Johnson
Ryan Garcia was found to have tested positive for a banned substance the day before and the day of his fight against Devin Haney—a fight where Garcia was able to win by majority decision as well.
The one substance that was picked up on both days was ostarine, though his A-sample also tested positive for 19-norandrosterone. Further lab tests are needed to confirm these findings fully, but those are the preliminary results for now. In response to this coming out, Garcia said, “Everybody knows that I don’t cheat. Never taken a steroid. I don’t even know where to get steroids. I barely take supplements. Big lies, I beat his a**”. Garcia basically said that the findings weren’t real, and his promotional group is currently looking into how “this finding came to be”.
Golden Boy Promotions released their statement after Garcia spoke out, and it reads, “Ryan has put out multiple statements denying knowingly using any banned substances, and we believe him.” Now, Haney and his group aren’t as happy about the findings considering how the fight played out. Haney himself said, “We learned about this situation not too long ago and it’s unfortunate Ryan cheated and disrespected both the fans and the sport of boxing by fighting dirty and breaking positive not once, but twice.” He later said that he thinks Ryan owes the fans an apology and that he’s not taking what happened seriously enough.
Ryan Garcia Had Questionable Behavior Leading Into Fight
Garcia had other problems leading up to this fight, such as some bizarre and questionable posts on social media that made it seem like he was having mental health issues. On top of that, he missed weight ahead of the fight by three pounds and had to pay Haney around $600,000 for missing the mark. Due to that, he wasn’t able to win the title from Haney either. Garcia, thanks to his 25-1 record with 20 knockouts, rose to number two in the junior welterweight rankings on ESPN. Haney fell to number four but held onto his title anyway.
One of the other times that ostarine has been found in boxing came when Lucian Bute tested positive for it in 2016. The result of that fight was a draw against Badou Jack in a title fight. However, once these findings were revealed, it was no longer classified as a draw, and Jack was listed as the winner due to disqualification for Bute. We could see something like that happen here between Garcia and Haney once further tests can confirm the findings.