By Sean Jones: Top Rank promoter Bob Arum says he wants to put together a fight between Teofimo Lopez and Gervonta ‘Tank’ Davis after the two fighters get past their next opponents.
If WBA ‘regular’ lightweight champion Tank Davis (25-0, 24 KOs) and his promoters at Mayweather Promotions agree to the match with Teofimo (16-0, 12 KOs), it will take place next year.
Interestingly, Arum didn’t make mention of a fight that Matchroom Boxing promoter Eddie Hearn has been talking nonstop about wanting to make between WBC lightweight champion Devin Haney and Teofimo for early 2022.
For Arum not to be talking of the fight between Teofimo and Haney, it suggests that he views the Tank Davis contest as the much bigger-money match-up. Tank vs. Teofimo would dwarf the money Teofimo-Haney would bring in.
The undefeated 26-year-old Gervonta is a bonified pay-per-view attraction, whereas the 22-year-old Haney (26-0, 15 KOs) is still starting in the sport and trying to gain fans with his finesse style of fighting.
Some boxing fans view Haney as a weak version of Floyd Mayweather Jr. once you take away his speed and much of the talent he once possessed when he was younger.
“I just think it was a travesty that after he [Teofimo] beat Lomachenko, he wasted a whole year with this whole nonsense with Triller. That really made no sense,” said Bob Arum to ESNEWS about Lopez wasting the last 12 months of his career by choosing to go the purse bid route for his mandatory defense against Kambosos Jr.
“Now, we’ll fight Kambosos, and in my opinion, there is only one winner in that fight [Teofimo] and then he’ll have his choice of some great fighters he can fight.
“Probably [Josh] Taylor won’t be available until the spring,” Arum continued. “The fight that I would like to see him fight is against Tank Davis. Definitely in Vegas,” Arum said when asked where he’d like to have the Gervonta vs. Teofimo fight staged.
“It’s a big, big pay-per-view. We now have an old track record of working closely with PBC. So if Floyd [Mayweather Jr.] and Tank want that fight, I think we can get it arranged.
“But Tank has shown the ability to draw, and Teofimo is Teofimo, and that would be a major, major fight. I love it also,” said Arum.
Gervonta Davis vs. Teofimo Lopez is a far bigger fight than for Teo to take on Devin Haney next year. No one wants to see Teofimo trying to pry Haney off of him for the last half of the fight once he begins staggering him the way 35-year-old former three-division world champion Jorge Linares did against Devin earlier this year on May 29th.
That fight was virtually unwatchable because of Haney hugging Linares nonstop from the 9th round after getting buzzed.
Looking back at that fight, Haney probably should have been disqualified by the referee for his excessive clinching because that’s all he did for the last four rounds, and he got away with it.
