Three-weight world champion Devin Haney has provided a major update on his next fight.
‘The Dream’ made his long-awaited return to the ring back in November when he outclassed countryman Brian Norman Jr to capture the WBO world welterweight title with a career-best performance.
Haney sent Norman to the canvas in the second round of their showdown at the ANB Arena in Riyadh and would ultimately get the nod on all three of the judges scorecards to win world honours in a third weight class.
As rumours begin to circulate about what is going to come next for Haney, the unbeaten 27-year-old has revealed in an interview with The Ring Magazine that he will ‘move on’ from a potential rematch with Ryan Garcia and target a clash with Rolando Romero if his former rival continues to be ‘unrealistic’ in negotiations.
“He has to be realistic in these negotiations, you know, I’m not here to just take anything to get back. Ryan Garcia, when the ball was in his court, he didn’t make weight, he showed up with a positive drug test. It was all over the place.
“So, you know, we’re not going to do it like that time around, we’re going to do it the right way and so, if he doesn’t want to do it the right way then we’ll move on. Like I said, we’ll go on to fight the guy that beat him and the guy that he doesn’t want to rematch.
“He’s not screaming Rolly’s name. So like I said, if that is the case then we go in and we fight Rolly, and if Ryan Garcia wants to get realistic, then we can make that fight happen now or later.”
Garcia pulled off a shock upset when he handed Haney the first defeat of his career back in April of 2024, but the result was later overturned after it was revealed that ‘King Ryan’ had returned a positive drugs test prior to the bout.
The 27-year-old from California was subsequently banned from boxing for one year and issued a hefty fine, although he has since made a return and finally became a world champion last month when he dethroned Mario Barrios of the WBC welterweight title in Las Vegas.
