By Jake Tiernan: Lightweight contender Keyshawn Davis doesn’t understand why Gervonta ‘Tank’ Davis hasn’t fought better opposition than he has during his ten-year professional career.
As far as Keyshawn is concerned, WBA ‘regular’ lightweight champion Tank Davis (28-0, 26 KOs) has fought only one good opponent in Jose Pedraza, and since then, he’s fought no one special.
Keyshawn likes that Tank is finally stepping it up at 28 by fighting Ryan Garcia, but it took him long enough. Still, he’s been getting all kinds of praise for beating lesser fighters up to this point, and it doesn’t make sense.
It hasn’t been only Tank’s fault that he’s been fighting cans all these years. Mayweather Promotions were picking out Tank Davis’ opposition and they clearly didn’t want to take chances with him and watch him get beat or worn down.
Tank Davis’ weak resume
“Yes, his record is not great. If you look at the whole landscape of 135 right now, you tell me how great it is. Let’s be real,” said Keyshawn Davis to Fighthype about Gervonta ‘Tank’ Davis.
“Now certain things does, ‘Hey, that was great.’ How he knocked Leo Santa Cruz out; that was crazy. That’s great, okay. Mario Barrios, moving up to go to 140, knock him out. Okay, that’s great. But he’s creating his own narrative. When is he going to fight somebody?
“What I mean by that is he’s not really fighting the real deal fighters, but he gets certain fights to make it interesting,” said Keyshawn.
On Ryan Garcia not taking tune-up
“Me personally, I would have taken the tune-up,” said Davis about Ryan Garcia, who chose not to take a tune-up to prepare himself for the Tank Davis fight. “You’re getting paid. You’re getting. One knockout can give you a million followers.
“A fight can open up so many doors and opportunities. You should never be like, ‘No, I’m going to wait,’ especially when you look at fighters like Sugar Ray Leonard and he was fighting double digits per year.
“He’s [Ryan] saying he doesn’t want to take a tune-up fight for his biggest fight of his career? That doesn’t make sense to me, but that not me; that’s him. I think the only way you can get better is to fight to keep getting rounds.
“You can train all you want, but when you get in the ring, it’s still a different atmosphere. Everything is different. Everything isn’t broken down slow. He’s been looking the same every fight,” said Keyshawn about Ryan not showing improvements in his game.
