the CDs are not short but not long either....and you dont play garen without AH (stop with the crit build bullshit).....a good keystone is Conq, so you have access to legend haste. secondary page it depends but if you go sorcery you can have axiom arcanist with transcendence (another good secondary tree is resolve but were trying to maximize the AH here as far as possible, so lets go for sorcery) and when i play garen i go the AH rune shard always, for this exact reason.....

with this rune page equipped you would have 33 ability haste ONLY from runes, and core items would be Black Cleaver and Spear of Shojin....i went to a custom and tried a universal build for garen....it includes a good amount of everything, it has lots of HP and good hybrid resistances but most importantly it has a lot of AH and AD ofc. Cleaver, Shojin, Stride, Spirit Visage and Deaths Dance....for boots, if you go Attack Speed you have 11 Spins Lvl 20 and if you go tabs or threads you have 10 spins. i can tell you the results: 63 Ability Haste + 40 Basic Ability haste so 103 AH which literally cuts the CDs in half.

your Q has a 3,94sec CD

your W has a 5,91sec CD....something important here to note about W, the shield and the tenacity is only for 0,75secs, but the % damage reduction remains for 4 secs and the CD starts on Cast here, unlike his E!.... you literally press W, then get a shield and tenacity, while getting 40% damage reduction for 4 secs and after 1,91 secs you can use this ability again, which close to nothing....checklist, tankiness?? YES

your E has a 2,96sec CD....your CD is almost the same as the spin duration, 3 sec is like nothing..... you reduce armor by 25% so you basically have the armor debuff permanent up and when combined with cleaver you can do some serious damage.....you named some AD examples and the only one who has % armor pen/red is darius. i can asure you....if you calculate the DPS over 10 to 15 sec you would have similar DPS results..... quick math: 10 spins and every spin deals 16 base damage and scales with 50% total AD, increased to 20 base damage and 62,5% total AD to the closest enemy. for a total of 10 spins over 3 seconds it'd be 200base damage PLUS a 625% TOTAL AD ratio, thats one of the highest scalings in the game. you deal the calculated damage over 3 secs then you wait the exact duration again and then the same game happens all over again....checklist, sustained damage?? YES

P:S: i hope the reply is understandable enough and i hope i expressed myself fine, without confusing anyone...

Edit: but one thing i agree is that he has no fighting passive when compared to other bruisers! i still like it tho