By Craig Daly: Gervonta ‘Tank’ Davis says he’s intentionally keeping quiet about his potential mega-fight against Ryan Garcia later this year because he feels the Southern California native isn’t reliable.
So instead of talking about the fight that is still iffy, Tank (27-0, 25 KOs) says he’s going to wait until the match is a done deal before he begins commenting on it.
Ryan’s track record has been poor as of late, with him pulling out of fights against Javier Fortuna and Joseph ‘Jojo’ Diaz in 2021. He also had the chance to fight Tank last year but then changed directions, saying he wanted to fight Manny Pacquiao.
Kingry also had the chance to fight Devin Haney after becoming his mandatory, but he changed his mind and sat for a year before fighting Emmanuel Tagoe last April.
On a positive note, Ryan announced on Friday that he’s agreeable to fighting Tank at any weight, be it 135 or whatever he wants. This was an excellent move because Tank’s promoter Floyd Mayweather said this week that he would not make the fight with Ryan unless he agreed to come down to 135.
“I haven’t been going back and forth with Ryan because we all know he’s not a man of his word, but I do know it’s a possibility of the fight happening. So I’d rather stay quiet till the deal is locked. Nothing means anything now,” said Gervonta Davis via Michael Benson.
If the fight does happen between Gervonta and the Golden Boy promoted Ryan Garcia, it’ll take place later this year, likely on Showtime PPV. Thanks to Ryan’s massive number of followers on Instagram, it’ll be a big affair.
Though Ryan still has never cut his teeth on world-class level fighters that were youthful and in their prime, he’s immensely popular with Instagram & YouTubers followers, who aren’t necessarily boxing fans. You can argue that Ryan is more of a social media star than a boxer superstar.
Tank has a lot of options besides Ryan to fight, so it doesn’t matter if their match-up fails to materialize. Hardcore boxing fans would love to see the former three-division world champion Tank fight Vasyl Lomachenko, Shakur Stevenson, or Devin Haney. Those guys are more qualified to challenge Tank for his WBA ‘regular’ lightweight title than Ryan.
In Ryan’s situation, if he doesn’t get the fight with Tank, it’ll likely result in Golden Boy matching him against former super featherweight champion Joseph ‘Jojo’ Diaz next.
Like Ryan’s last opponent Fortuna, Diaz is a fighter much smaller than him, who can’t punch and doesn’t belong at 135, particularly at 140.
