Teofimo Lopez Snr believes Devin Haney is suing Ryan Garcia just to save his “destroyed image”.

Garcia earned a decision over Haney in April in New York, where he also recorded three knockdowns. His majority decision was later declared a no contest following Garcia’s testing positive for the banned substance ostarine.

Haney has filed an alleged fraud, battery, and unjust enrichment lawsuit against Garcia – five months after the former was fined $1.1million and suspended for a year.

“Devin Haney is just trying to play chess and trying to put the right pawns on the right spots so he could get the best of what had happened to him and his image because Ryan Garcia destroyed his image,” Lopez Snr, the father and trainer of the WBO junior-lightweight champion – and therefore Haney’s rival – Teofimo Jnr, told Fight Hub TV.

Haney, 25, is still to return to the ring since that fight with the 26-year-old Garcia, and it is already being questioned if he will be the same fighter when he does so. 

“I don't know if it's true but Ryan Garcia said that you could grab a little bit of salt and put it in an Olympic pool and that's how much substance he had in his body,” Lopez Snr continued. 

“I don't know how true that is. But if that's the case, man, you know what I'm saying?”

Bernard Neequaye is a sports journalist with a specialty in boxing coverage. He wrote a boxing column titled “From The Ringside” in his native Ghana for years. He can be reached on X (formerly Twitter) at @BernardNeequaye, LinkedIn at Bernard Neequaye and through email at bernardneequaye@gmail.com.