Floyd Mayweather Jr reacts to Tank Davis win over Barrios

By Boxing News - 06/27/2021 - Comments

By Allan Fox: Floyd Mayweather Jr took over Gervonta ‘Tank’ Davis’ post-fight press conference last Saturday night, letting the media know what he told him to get the eleventh round knockout victory over WBA ‘regular’ light welterweight champion Mario Barrios (26-1, 17 KOs) at the State Farm Arena in Atlanta.

Davis’ promoter Mayweather said he told him before the eighth round that he was behind on the “unofficial scorecards’ and he needed to pick it up to defeat Barrios.

Mayweather’s pep talk helped Tank

The advice from Mayweather proved crucial, as Davis when on the attack, dropping the taller 5’10” Barrios with a big right hand in the round, battering him with heavy shots.

Barrios came back and fought well in the ninth and tenth rounds, catching Gervonta with hard shots to the head. It was a situation where Barrios took advantage of Tank’s overaggressiveness because he was too much in a hurry to get him of there after dropping him in the eighth round.

In the eleventh, Davis dropped Barrios with a left to the body. After Barrios got back up, Davis landed a couple of more shots before the referee stepped in and stopped the fight.

Image: Floyd Mayweather Jr reacts to Tank Davis win over Barrios

You can argue it was a premature stoppage, but Davis was going to finish Barrios anyway because he was going to tee off on him before he had a chance to recover.

Floyd told Tank he was trailing

“Floyd was asking me to press him, but I was ‘I don’t know, I won’t want to get caught,'” said Gervonta Davis at the post-fight press conference talking about his win over Barrios. “It was the eighth, Floyd came to me, ‘You’re down on the scorecards, unofficial.”

“I told you to pick it up and show me you’re great,” said Floyd Mayweather Jr interrupting Davis to remind him what he told him before the eighth round.

“We went to the eleventh, and I told you, ‘we’re going to press his a** now and do what we got to do.’ I told you no matter what weight class you go to, once you hit him with that equalizer, he’s going to find out what it really is,” said Mayweather.

Mayweather to keep Tank Davis in-house

“The team will take care of that,” said Mayweather when asked who Davis will fight next. “Our thing is this, ‘We work smarter, not harder.’ We keep everything in-house, Mayweather Promotions, PBC, we’re all one family.

YouTube video

“We’re not going to go nowhere and make another company great,” said Mayweather about his intention of not matching Tank Davis against non-PBC and Mayweather Promotions fighters.

“So we got plenty of fighters at 140, 135, and 130 that we’re going to continue to fight the fighters that we’ve got to fight,” said Mayweather.

So what Mayweather is saying is that his company Mayweather Promotions won’t be setting up fights between Tank Davis and fighters from other promotional companies. That’s obviously disappointing.

If you’re wondering why Tank Davis was matched against Barrios, he’s one of their fighters.

With Mayweather saying that he WON’T be letting Tank fight other fighters from outside promotional companies, it means that we won’t see Tank Davis fight any of these guys:

  • Vasily Lomachenko
  • Ryan Garcia
  • Devin Haney
  • Shakur Stevenson
  • Oscar Valdez
  • Josh Taylor
  • Jose Ramirez
  • Regis Prograis

Gervonta’s career will be stunted

 

It’s going to be hard for Tank Davis to become great and bring in a ton of pay-per-view buys if Mayweather will only let him fight PBC and Mayweather Promotions fighters.

There aren’t enough quality fighters from those two companies at 130, 135, and 140 for Tank to fight to get fans interested.

If all fans are going to see is Tank fighting secondary champions, as we saw with Barrios last night, what kind of career will he have? At least Mayweather took some risks with how career early on, but it sounds like he’s not willing to let Tank do the same.

In other words, Mayweather will stunt Tank’s career by keeping him in-house against the PBC and Mayweather Promotions fighters. It wouldn’t be a big deal if those companies were stacked with talent at 130, 135, and 140, but they’re not.

Image: Floyd Mayweather Jr reacts to Tank Davis win over Barrios

PBC’s best fighters are 147, and Davis is clearly too small to move up to that weight class to pick fights.

If Tank stays at super featherweight, lightweight, or continues to fight at light welterweight, he’ll have no one to compete against other than lesser guys.

Ultimately, Mayweather’s decision to keep Tank fighting in-house opposition within his company and PBC will help his career because he would likely get beaten by Vasily Lomachenko, Teofimo, Shakur Stevenson, Oscar Valdez, Regis Prograis and Josh Taylor.

It’s still disappointing to hear that Mayweather won’t allow Tank to fight the best.

What we saw last Saturday night wasn’t a case of Tank Davis fighting the best a 140. Barrios was a secondary champion, AKA paper champion, and he’s nowhere near as talented as the elite fighters in the division.

It’s fair to say that Barrios ranks in this spot at 140 in terms of the best fighters in the division:

1. Josh Taylor
2. Regis Prograis
3. Jose Ramirez
4. Jose Zepeda
5. Jose Pedraza
6. Viktor Postol
7. Gary Antuanne Russell
8. Shakhram Giyasov
9. Jeremias Ponce
10. Subriel Matias
11. Robert Easter Jr
12. Ivan Branchyk
13. Arnold Barboza
14. Mario Barrios

Mario is a top 15 fighter, but he’s not one of the elite guys in the 140-lb division. The only reason Barrios held the WBA secondary light welterweight title is that the World Boxing Association sanctioned his fight against Batyr Ahmedov to be for their vacant belt.

If Barrios had to fight one of the above guys on this writer’s list, he wouldn’t have become a champion.

YouTube video

“I remember telling him you’re going to win world titles in numerous weight classes,” Mayweather said in remembering a conversation he had many years ago with Tank Davis. “I did what I said I was going to do. As long as he keeps winning, there’s no limit to how far we can go.

“No, it was just me trying to figure him out to see what he does good,” said Gervonta when asked if Barrios surprised him early.

“I didn’t want to overdo it and wind up getting caught because I didn’t know what he was bringing. Basically, I didn’t get him out of there because of myself early. If I knew he was soft, I would have got him out of there,” said Tank Davis.