By Allan Fox: Promoter Bob Arum thinks it’s a “stupid” idea that was floated recently by Floyd Mayweather Jr. for Naoya Inoue to move up in weight to fight that much larger Gervonta ‘Tank’ Davis at a catchweight.
Arum says Tank Davis is essentially a 140-pounder at this point in his career and much too big for ‘Monster’ Inoue (25-0, 22 KOs), who just recently moved up to 122 to dethrone WBC & WBO super bantamweight champion Stephen Fulton.
Arum said if Inoue is going to move up in weight again, it would be to go to 126 to challenge WBO featherweight champion Robeisy Ramirez, who is arguably the best fighter in that division today.
Floyd came up with his wacky idea when the subject of Inoue was brought up to him, and he then went on a rant, complaining about how Tank Davis isn’t ranked high in the pound-for-pound lists, which it’s obvious why.
The next thing you know, Mayweather is talking about wanting Inoue to come up in weight to fight Tank Davis at a catchweight, which would prove nothing. If Tank wins, it would be another example of him fighting a smaller guy brought up in weight to ensure he doesn’t lose.
Instead of Mayweather & PBC only focusing on money fights for easy coin for Tannk Davis, they should work on building his legacy by matching him against fighters that could get him ranked in the pound-for-poujnd lists.
No more gimmes against influencers/boxers like Ryan Garcia. Tank needs to fight these guys if he & Flloyd want him to be put on the pound-for-pound lists near the top:
- Shakur Stevenson
- Vasily Lomachenko
- Edwin De Los Santos
- Subriel Matias
- Jaron Ennis
- Devin Haney
- Frank Martin
- Teofimo Lopez
- William Zepeda
- Abdullah Mason
- Raymond Muratalla
Naoya’s management wouldn’t match him with Tank
“Inoue started at 108, and now he’s worked his way up to 122. He is a tremendous star in Japan,” said Bob Arum to Fight Hub TV. “Virtually nobody in Japan knows who Tank Davis is, and why would Inoue, who is undersized at 122, talk about fighting a guy [Gervonta] who’s essentially a junior welterweight at 140 pounds? It makes absolutely no sense.
“I mean, would Inoue have any chance with Shakur? Probably not. Shakur’s way too big for him. Let’s not be carried away. Terence Crawford showed what a great fighter he was the other week, but you wouldn’t want to put him in with Tyson Fury.
“Yeah, I know he [Gervonta Davis] sells in the U.S, but again, it doesn’t
it’s not good for Inoue to rush up and fight guys so much bigger than he is. I don’t care about the stature of Tank. That’s why they call him Tank. He’s the bigger person.
“Inoue looked like a shrimp compared to Fulton. I was there. I said, ‘Oh, my God, this is going to be tough.’ He handled Fulton easily. Well, let’s see what he does with the Filipino [Marlon Tapales], and then there are guys at 126 that will test him, like [Robeisy] Ramirez from [Cuba]. Let’s see how he [Inoue] does there.
“To put him in with 140 pounder [Gervonta], you got to be stupid, and the Japanese are not stupid. Japanese in the business, Ohashi, Honda, they’re good boxing people. They understand boxing
“It’s dumb to think about it. Maybe a year from now, two years from now, it won’t be, but right now, it is,” said Arum when asked about a potential fight between Inoue and Vasily Lomachenko at 130.
“122 is a reach for in a way it’s not that A, he’s starving himself to make the weight. No, he has no problems making the weight. Most of his opponents, including the Filipino kid [Tapales] that he’s going to fight are much bigger than he is. So again, one step at a time,” said Arum.
