Kevin Garcia Pro Boxing Advance – Fight vs. Jack Grady of Buffalo, N.Y., June 20, 2015 at Valley Forge Casino Resort
By Barry Sankey
bsankey@21st-centurymedia.com
PHOENIXVILLE >> Kevin Garcia’s camp does not know much about his next professional boxing opponent, Jack Grady.
Grady is from Buffalo, N.Y., so even in this day and age of social media networking, the film on him from the upstate New York area is simply not there.
It all means that Garcia and his trainers, Jimmy Deoria and Joe Rowan, will be making more adjustments on the fly as the bout progresses during the Garcia-Grady fight, a scheduled four-round affair set for Saturday night, June 20, at the Valley Forge Casino Resort Hotel in King of Prussia.
Garcia (1-1) is coming off his first pro victory, back on April 18 at Valley Forge, while Grady will enter the ring with an 0-1 record.
“I am more confident this time after my first win,” said Garcia during a practice session at the Phoenixville Civic Center June 1.
The other reason Garcia is more confident entering this fight is because he continues to spar against top competition that Deoria and Rowan have arranged for him as road preparation for each scheduled encounter.
“I am sparring against Philly competition,” said Garcia. “I am sparring more guys who are coming on to me. The other guy was more in and out. I have seen a couple good guys.”
On June 2, Garcia and his trainers traveled to the Harrowgate Boxing Club in Philadelphia to work against Milton Santiago, an 18-year-old star with a lot of amateur experience. Santiago was also victorious on the last card held at Valley Forge.
“He (Grady) likes to switch his body from left to right,” said Rowan. “That was from what we saw from him 10 years ago when he was an amateur. He seems to be a standup boxer. We are going in blind with this guy.
“We want Kevin to see different styles, but we did not really make any changes for this fight. Kevin is a little more intense because he is getting more confidence.”
Following the last fight, Garcia took only about a week and a half to rest before resuming regular training for this next fight.
He faithfully heeds to Deoria’s advice to do a lot of running work on his own to keep in excellent shape.
Garcia will be fighting real close to home again so he will have a large throng of supporters on hand in terms of his immediate family, close relatives and other friends who make a lot of noise to help him going at a high level of intensity.
“It was easy to let my body heal,” said Garcia. “I will let my body relax a little bit and then start camp again. I should have more people, and there is more interest already.”
Garcia has already moved more than 100 tickets for his fight. So that means promoter Marshall Kauffman will keep him at the back end of the card to heighten the possible interest in the fight.
Deoria talked about the April fight.
“There was a really nice turnout for Kevin, and he had a really nice fight,” said Deoria.
Garcia’s initial pro boxing victory was a unanimous four-round decision over Eric Hall of Philadelphia. All three judges scored the bout 40-35 in favor of Garcia. Garcia had dropped his pro debut in a close decision against left-hander Jerome Conquest back on March 6 in south Philadelphia.
Deoria is being careful about what opponents he puts Garcia in the ring against during these early stages of his pro career with not a lot of amateur experience either.
“We will have to make adjustments as the fight progresses,” said Deoria. “That is part of the learning process. As he moves up to six, eight and 10-rounds, he will be doing more running, swimming and conditioning for each fight.”
Garcia is also still working his regular fulltime job, in which he has been putting in at least 50 hours per week through six days of putting in his time.
“I am busy,” said Garcia. “I don’t wake up until after I work 10 hours and then come to the gym.”
“Things like that are what make Kevin a role model for our younger kids,” said Deoria.
Tickets are available through Deoria by calling him at 610-659-1308.