Conor Benn on ESPN’s ‘First Take’ Regarding Ryan Garcia: ‘I’m Just Excited to Smack This Kid In The Face’

Fresh off the Labor Day holiday weekend, fight week began for the WBC welterweight title fight on Saturday night at the T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas, Nevada, live on Paramount+. Naturally, there were mainstream media hits for both fighters, but on this specific day, things got heated between Ryan Garcia (25-2, 20 KOs) and Conor Benn (25-1, 14 KOs) during their interview on ESPN’s First Take.

During this portion of the segment, Garcia was asked about Benn and about the confidence he has going into fight night.

“This guy is raving about a fight he put a rehydration clause on,” Garcia said, referring to the Chris Eubank Jr. fight. “He’s raving about so many things that he is oblivious to. Guess what, you lost that fight too. I just don’t like that he lives in delusion. This dude is delusional. He keeps saying he’s done all this and that. He doesn’t have experience. I don’t know what he’s talking about.”

Garcia was then asked by host Shae Cornette to explain why he believes the fight will end in five rounds or less.

“Watching him box,” he said. “I’ve watched him over his whole career. I’ve studied him inside and out. He’s simply just not at my level at all. All he’s going to try to do is bum rush me, which I have already dealt with my whole life. He can’t outbox me, so what is he going to do? Come forward, that’s it. That’s all he can do.”

When the camera turned to Benn for his final thoughts on the fight and on what Garcia said, he simply smiled and delivered one final verbal jab. “I’m just excited to smack this kid in the face,” said Benn. “That’s literally it. Like, there’s nothing else.”

Due to the condensed week, it’s taken a little time for the buzz to build for this fight, but this back-and-forth got things started. With the press conference and Friday’s weigh-in still on the horizon, expect things to get even more confrontational between these two fighters before they do it for real on Saturday night.

Abraham Gonzalez

Abraham Gonzalez is a 2x award-winning writer, International Boxing Hall of Fame voter, founder and publisher of FightsATW. His journalistic work has been published and used across several platforms, including online, network TV, and promotional companies. He is an alumnus of an American Public University and a full member of the Boxing Writers Association of America (BWAA). Abraham was the Managing Editor for NYFights, Big Fight Weekend, and contributed to The Ring Magazine, FanSidedMMA, and ProBoxTV.

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