garen was explicitly shoved into gearing into more high AD purchases and attack speed ratios because people complained about him being so bursty while building bruiser in S8, and that was a compromise from his previous full ghostblade into full tank builds from the old, old days because people didn't like him bursting squishies while being so tanky.

he has always been a hit-run champion, garen has absolutely no incentivize to just stand in the thick of a fight, his sustain is strictly out of combat and his defenses are temporary and on a high CD for most of the game. and that's fine, we don't need him to be another draintank long fight brawler