MoVal Resident, Pro Boxer Mikey Garcia Heads to MGM

MORENO VALLEY>> Miguel Angel Garcia, also known as Mikey Garcia, a Mexican-American professional boxer, is making a comeback at a fight against WBC Lightweight Champion, Dejan Zlaticanin, Saturday, Jan. 28 at MGM Grand in Las Vegas, Nevada. Zlaticanin is from Podgorica, Montenegro and has a pro record of 22-0-0, with 15 KOs. Garcia-Zlaticanin is scheduled for twelve rounds in the lightweight division, live on SHOWTIME. Garcia is a former two-time WBO world champion in the featherweight and super featherweight divisions. He resides in Moreno Valley, California, and trains in Riverside at the Robert Garcia Boxing Academy. Although he was exposed to the boxing lifestyle at a young age, Garcia, the youngest of seven children, said he never thought about becoming a professional fighter. When Garcia was 14 years old, he became an amateur boxer and won his first fight. As he continued to work hard, his classmates at school saw him on TV in the ring with other fighters. When he was a freshman in high school, a teacher advised him to quit boxing because his grades had been suffering from being away at fights. Although he was advised to quit, he never did. He pursued his dreams and after only nine amateur fights, he competed in the California Junior Olympic boxing tournament, where he won the district and regional tournaments, and made it to the national tournament finals. In the finals, he experienced his first amateur defeat to a more experienced, Michael Concepcion of New Jersey. Later that year, he won his first amateur boxing tournament, the Junior Golden Gloves in Chattanooga, Tennessee. He won all of the preliminary rounds of the tournament by knockout and earned a unanimous decision in the finals. After winning the Junior Golden Gloves Championship, Garcia competed at the National PAL tournament in Virginia Beach, Virginia, and returned home with a silver medal. Later, he compete in the National PAL in Oxnard where he defeated Michael Evans and eventually won the tournament. After the PAL Tournament victory in Oxnard, Garcia competed in the 2006 U.S. Olympic Trials in the 132 lb lightweight division. In his first fight of the Olympic Trials, held in Colorado, he lost a decision to Terence Crawford. The Olympics were not scheduled to take place until 2008, so Garcia elected to turn professional. He finished his amateur career with a record of 48-12, with 22 KOs. At age 18, Garcia received several promotional offers to become a professional and only one month after graduating from high school, he turned professional and signed a promotional deal with Bob Arum of Top Rank and manager Cameron Dunkin. At the start of his professional boxing career, Garcia balanced boxing activities with his schoolwork, even earning a 3.8 GPA one semester. He graduated from Pacifica High School in Oxnard, with a 3.2 GPA. Following high school, he attended Oxnard Community College and completed a two-year liberal arts and science degree. At 20 years old, he joined the Ventura County Police and Sheriff’s Reserve Academy. While attending the academy, his typical day included running in the early morning, followed by college classes, then training at the boxing gym at night. After boxing training, he had to report to the Sheriff's Office for further police training. Garcia kept this routine while having two of his professional boxing fights. He graduated from the Ventura Police and Sheriff’s Academy in January 2010 but decided to focus solely on boxing. He continued his boxing career and fought Puerto Rican southpaw, Jose Hernandez, in 2008 and had his first major televised appearance in a co-main event on an HBO broadcast in Atlantic City against Matt Remillard in 2011. In that fight, he dropped Remillard twice in the ninth round, and once in the 10th round, causing the referee to stop the fight. In 2011, Garcia fought Rafael Guzman in the HBO co-main event in Los Angeles and stopped him in the fourth round. In that same year, he continued to fight in Madison Square Garden, which was also broadcasted on HBO. Over the next few years, Garcia traveled to Puerto Rico, Las Vegas and New York City to take part in his passion of boxing. In 2013, Garcia was scheduled to make his first title defense against Juan Manuel Lopez but had to take off several days from training due to illness. Garcia was not able to recover in enough time and making weight was not attainable. He was 1.75 lb over and lost his 126 lb title on the scales. Garcia said he was crushed because he was not able to defend the title he had recently won. He stopped Lopez in round four but was unable to retain his title. After the Lopez fight, Garcia decided to move up in weight to challenge 130 lb WBO Super Featherweight Champion, Rocky Martinez. He defeated Martinez with a knockout in round eight, becoming a two-division world champion. Garcia successfully defended his title in 2014, in a wide, unanimous decision win against Juan Carlos Burgos on HBO. In October 2014, Garcia vacated his WBO Super Featherweight belt, and planned to move up in weight.