By Dan Ambrose: Gervonta ‘Tank’ Davis says he’ll beat up former WBA light welterweight champion Regis Prograis if the two fight.
This would be a dangerous fight for Davis, as Prograis is bigger and stronger than Tank, and he can punch with huge power with either hand.
The problems we saw Tank Davis having against 130 and 135-lb would be greatly magnified if he took on Prograis.
Tank (24-0, 23 KOs) is expected to move up to 140 for his next fight to challenge WBA secondary champion Mario Barrios (26-0, 17 KOs), which will be hard enough for him.
Prograis (25-1, 21 KOs) is arguably a better fighter than Barrios and would likely knock him out within six rounds or less.
It’s unclear how Tank would do against Prograis, but based on how he struggled to defeat 38-year-old Yuriorkis Gamboa in his only fight at 135 in 2019, he won’t do well against Regis.
“I will beat the s*** out this bum a**,” said Tank Davis on Twitter.
It’s likely just talk from Tank Davis because he looks like his main focus is being an opportunist by going up to 140 to win an easy belt against WBA champion Mario Barrios.
It would be a different story if Tank moved up to 140 to take on IBF/WBA 140lb champion Josh Taylor or WBC/WBO champion Jose Ramirez. Those fighters are tall at 5’10”, and they have more talent than Barrios.
Tank didn’t look all that great in his last fight against Leo Santa Cruz at 130 last October. The season for Tank’s move back down to 130 is because he wasn’t comfortable at 135.
If Tank will go all the way up to 140 to pick up a belt against WBA champion Barrios, it’s likely just a one-and-done type of situation.
By capturing the WBA light welterweight belt from Barrios, Tank can brag that he’s a three-division world champion. Whether that’ll translate to Tank getting more money from Showtime for his fights is debatable.
In theory, it’s nice when a fighter captures world titles in multiple divisions as Tank has done, but he’s not beaten a lot of great fighters to win his belts. Tank has beaten ho-hum opposition, who weren’t great fighters, to begin with.
Tank’s world title wins:
- Jose Pedraza – IBF 130
- Jesus Marcelo Andres Cuellar – WBA 130
- Yuriorkis Gamboa – WBA ‘regular’ 135
Prograis, 32, will be fighting next month on a Triller card against Ivan Redkach (23-5-1, 18 KOs) in a 10-round fight on April 17th in Atlanta, Georgia.
Regis is trying to work his way to a world title shot after losing his WBA 140lb title to Josh Taylor by a 12 round majority decision in the World Boxing Super Series tournament in October 2019 in Manchester, England.
That was a fight in which Taylor jumped out to a big early lead in the first half of the contest, thanks to Prograis choosing to fight him on the inside.
Prograis changed it up in the second half, taking action to the outside, and he dominated Taylor the rest of the way. Prograis ran out of rounds for him to come all the way back.