Garcia, who is unbeaten in all of his 36 professional fights, is coming off three-fight win streak since losing to Shawn Porter by a unanimous decision in June 2015 at the MGM Grand Garden Arena in Paradise, Nevada.
Pacquiao is set to face unbeaten Australian challenger Jeff Horn on July 2 at the Suncorp Arena in Brisbane, Australia. At stake is Pacquiao’s WBO welterweight title.
Garcia has set his sight on Pacquiao after signing the contract to face Broner on July 29 at 140 pounds.
“My focus is still at lightweight and possibly 140, but the name that I really would like to hopefully sometime soon be able to get would be Manny Pacquiao,” he told Boxing Scene.
“I know he’s at 147, but people at Top Rank and even Manny’s team have already talked and mentioned my name in recent conversations. That might be something that interests me enough to go ahead and fight Manny,” Garcia added.
Before Garcia voice his preference to face Pacquiao at the light welterweight limit of 140 pounds, Pacquiao’s longtime trainer Freddie Roach has already given his blessing for the proposed fight at 140 pounds when Garcia’s brother/trainer, former world champion Robert Garcia offered his brother to face Pacquiao soon.
Roach is confident Pacquiao will get past Horn on July 2 and looks forward to clear the way for a possible fight against Garcia at 140 pounds.
“[Horn is] a good fight to see where he’s at and who’s gonna be next. The thing is, it’s kind of a tune-up fight for us and who he has next… Mikey Garcia’s brother came to me the other day and said to me ‘will you fight my brother?’ I said ‘sure.’ I love that fight. I don’t make the final decisions, but it’s a possible future fight. That’s what we’re looking for right now, a tune-up fight and then on to bigger and better things,” Roach told Boxing Scene in another interview last month
While Roach prefers Garcia for Pacquiao’s next fight, he isn’t in full control of the selection process for Pacquiao’s opponents. He said Bob Arum, who promotes Pacquiao makes the decision in consultation with the eight-division world champ.
Arum has already mentioned Terence Crawford and Amir Khan as possible opponents of Pacquiao after the Horn fight in Brisbane.
