By Sean Jones: Yuriorkis Gamboa’s right Achilles is a full tear, not a partial one, from his fight last December against Gervonta ‘Tank’ Davis. Instead of Gamboa (30-3, 18 KOs) being able to treat his injured ankle with rest and rehabilitation, he’ll require surgery to fix the problem.
(Photo credit: Amanda Westcott/SHOWTIME)
Gamboa and Davis were fighting for the vacant WBA ‘regular’ lightweight title. Davis came into the fight as a heavy favorite over Gamboa, and he was expected to beat him with ease. The fact that Davis struggled to win was a bad look for him.
Yuriorkis showed heart fighting with injured ankle
Gamboa deserves a lot of respect for being able to fight with his torn Achilles for as long as he did against Davis. With that an injury that bad, a lot of fighters would have quit on the spot.
The next move for the former IBF/WBA featherweight champion Gamboa is to have this injured Achilles surgically repaired. He’s got to hope that he can come back this, seeing that he’s too old to be out of the ring for a lengthy amount of time.
That’s obviously bad news for the 38-year-old Gamboa, since it’s going to keep him on the shelf for a long time.
Gamboa tore his right Achilles in his 12th round stoppage loss to unbeaten Tank Davis (23-0, 22 KOs) on December 28 on their fight on Showtime Boxing at the State Farm Arena in Atlanta. Shortly after Gamboa suffered the injury, he posted on social media that he thought he would be able to simply rehab get by without surgery.
The 2004 Cuban Olympic gold medalist Gamboa was injured when was dropped in the 2nd round of his fight with Gervonta. Gamboa got back up, and fought as well as he could for the next 9 rounds until Tank Davis stopped him in the 12th.
Davis dropped Gamboa in rounds 2, 8 and 12. Had Davis been in better condition, he might have gotten Gamboa out of there much earlier, but he looked tired after the first three rounds.
Although Davis denied being winded, it was clear that he didn’t have the engine to finish Gamboa as fast as he wanted to. This was a fight that Gamboa exposed Davis despite losing the fight. The day before their fight, Tank Davis failed to make weight on the first weigh-in attempt.
Gamboa has grade 3 tear of his right Achilles
Davis did make weight on his second try, but it was a bad look on his part that he came in overweight, again. This wasn’t the first time that Tank Davis came in heavy. In August 2017, Gervonta came in over the 130-lb limit for his title defense of his IBF super featherweight belt against Francisco Fonseca. Subsequently, Davis was stripped of his IBF belt.
My injury sustained in the 2d round…complete tear (grade 3) verified as per MRI and board certified Dr. I went 12 with Davis and did my best under the circumstances. Like I said, lets dance again when Im at 💯 @SHOsports @b_sutterer @premierboxing @WBABoxing @MayweatherPromo pic.twitter.com/GF22dYk4GF
— Yuriorkis Gamboa (@gamboa) January 13, 2020
Gamboa said after the fight that he wanted a rematch with Davis, but that’s not going to happen. Now that it’s been revealed that Gamboa has a torn Achilles, he can call for a rematch with Davis, but it’s not going to matter. Davis is moving on looking for other avenues.
