By Jim Calfa: Devin Haney is unhappy about Vasily Lomachenko not helping him sell their May 20th fight on ESPN PPV, forcing him to do all the work himself to attract interest in their title clash at MGM Grand Garden Arena in Las Vegas.
If the 35-year-old Lomachenko (17-2, 11 KOs) has chosen not to wear himself out marketing their fight, it’s understandable. He’s coming off a lackluster performance in a contest he came close to losing against Jamaine Ortiz last October in New York.
Lomachenko’s fans blamed that effort partly on him returning from serving time in the Russian-Ukrainian war. Some of that performance also could be attributed to age and the fact that Loma was fighting a guy that should be competing at 140. Ortiz is huge for the 135-lb division, and he badly outsized Lomachenko.
It’s going to get worse for Lomachenko next month because Haney is even bigger than Jamaine Ortiz, much bigger. Watching Haney work out, it’s clear that he should be competing in the welterweight division against guys similar size as him, like Errol Spence Jr, Jaron Ennis, and Terence Crawford.
If Lomachenko were to wear himself out trying to market his ESPN PPV fight against Haney, he’d have no chance of winning. It would have been better if Top Rank hadn’t put the Haney-Lomachenko fight on pay-per-view because the two could focus on training.
The 24-year-old Haney is young enough to singlehanded promote his fight with Lomachenko without it wearing him out. What could give Haney a problem is draining down from 160 to 135 to make weight.
Taking all that water weight will torture Devin, and it could weaken him in the fight, making him vulnerable in the championship rounds. This wouldn’t be an issue if Haney were campaigning at welterweight because he’d only need to drain down from 160 to 147 to make weight.
“Loma doesn’t want to sell the fight. I knew he would be quiet. He should. Stay quiet. He’s on his way out. Goodbye,” said Devin Haney to RealDevinHaneyTV about his unhappiness about Lomachenko not helping to sell their May 20th fight on ESPN PPV.
“I don’t care to watch any of the guys from the lightweight division,” Haney continued. “I don’t care to focus on them because they got to go through me. I hold the keys to the lightweight division.”
The reality is, Haney won’t be able to stay at lightweight much longer, so whatever “keys” he believes he holds, they’re on loan. He can’t continue to artificially stay in the 135-lb division for much longer.
If Gervonta Davis or Shakur Stevenson choose not to fight Haney this year, he will likely need to move up to 140 or 147, whether he wants to or not. Shakur would gladly fight Haney next, but the feelings don’t appear to be mutual.
Haney hasn’t been showing the same interest in fighting him. Stevenson is a bad match-up for Haney, and he won’t beat him by jabbing & clinching as he did in his wins over George Kambosos Jr, Joseph ‘JoJo’ Diaz, and Jorge Linares.
“Everything runs through me. I’m the one who put structure into the lightweight division. It was all ‘email this and that,’ one belt over here, that belt over there,” said Haney.
“When Devin Haney came, he set it straight, so I’m the boss. I run the lightweight division. You want something in the lightweight division, you got to go through me.”
