By Keith Idec

Boxing fans and media mostly have been rough on Danny Garcia, deservedly so sometimes.

Garcia grew to accept that harsh reality long ago. The undefeated fighter from Philadelphia wisely has used the near-constant criticism as motivation during his reign as a junior welterweight champion.

The 27-year-old Garcia (30-0, 17 KOs) just wishes he got as much credit for his signature victories over heavily favored Lucas Matthysse and Amir Khan as he gets grief for debatable majority decision wins against Mauricio Herrera and Lamont Peterson and his decision last summer to fight absurdly overmatched Rod Salka.

“I think that’s just the luck I’ve got in boxing,” Garcia said during a conference call Tuesday to promote his Aug. 1 welterweight fight against Paulie Malignaggi (33-6, 7 KOs) at Barclays Center in Brooklyn. “Because I’ve been the underdog before and I won, and then it’s like, ‘Ah, he got lucky.’ So if either I’m the favorite or the underdog and I win, it might never be enough. But I can’t feed into none of that stuff. I have to go into each fight like I always am – mentally prepared, physically prepared and go in there and get the job done.

“If it’s good enough for the media and good enough for the fans, I’m happy. But if it’s not, I’m still happy because, you know, it takes a real man to go in there and put gloves on and fight another man for 12 rounds. It takes a lot of discipline to stay in the gym for 10 weeks straight, waking up every day, doing the same thing – sweat, blood, tears, all that stuff. So I would love for the fans and the media to love me, but it is what it is. They’re tough on me and that’s what keeps the chip on my shoulder. That’s what makes me train hard every day.”

Keith Idec covers boxing for The Record and Herald News, of Woodland Park, N.J., and BoxingScene.com. He can be reached on Twitter @Idecboxing.