By Jack Tiernan: Gervonta ‘Tank’ Davis (27-0, 25 KOs) held onto his WBA ‘regular’ lightweight title with a one-punch knockout in the sixth round against the powerful challenger Rolando ‘Rolly’ Romero (14-1, 12 KOs)
In the sixth round, Tank landed a beautiful left-hand counter that put Rolly down. It was too big of a shot from Gervonta for Rolando to recover from and be allowed to continue.
As a result. the referee David Fields made the right move by stepping in to stop the fight right away from Rolly made it to his feet.
The way Rolly looked when he got back up, he looked spaced out with his legs completely gone. It would have been a crime if the referee Fields had allowed the action to continue because Rolly’s legs had turned to rubber.
Erislandy Lara defeats Gary ‘Spike’ O’Sullivan
In the chief support bout, WBA ‘regular’ middleweight champion Erislandy Lara (29-3-3, 17 KOs) showed that he still had a little left in the fuel tank at age 39, stopping the heavy-handed #10 WBA Gary ‘Spike’ O’Sullivan (31-5, 21 KOs) in the eighth round.
O’Sullivan seemed to never fully recover after being dropped hard in the fourth round from a left-hand shot that caused him to go down in a delayed reaction.
Lara was like a surgeon after that round, taking his time, picking his shots, and hurting the 37-year-old O’Sullivan in each round.
At the end of the seventh, Lara hurt O’Sullivan badly with a shot near the end of the round. You could tell from how O’Sullivan looked that he wasn’t going to make it through the next round.
Sure enough, in the eighth round, Lara hurt O’Sullivan with a big left hand that staggered him. The referee stepped in and stopped the fight at that point, which was a good stoppage.
“This is what we do. I really understand the marketplace. I chose to come here to New York because I wanted to blow this thing out,” said Mayweather Promotions CEO Leonard Ellerbe.
“We’ve proven we can go East Coast, West Coast, anywhere. Gervonta Davis is one of the biggest stars in the entire sport, and he will soon be the face of boxing.
“Coming off this terrific performance, we’ll sit down and figure it out,” Ellerbe said when asked where does Tank Davis go from here.
“He’ll take a little bit of time off, and he’ll be back on Showtime Championship Boxing, trust me. I thought he performed very well. He showed the world that he’s a really strong fighter, and it’s going to be hard to beat him.
“If you can’t punch, you’ve got no shot against Rolly, I’m telling you now. I don’t care how much skills that you have, Rolly is one of the top lightweights in the world. I’ve been saying that.
“Yes, he’s awkward and he doesn’t have the experience. You can’t judge a fighter. He just got knocked out. You don’t know if he’s really coherent, you don’t know what’s going on or if he’s concussed. He’s a good sportsman.