Tank Davis will face Lamont Roach on December 14 in Houston, Texas.
Gervonta Davis is still excited about his victory this past June over Frank Martin. The devastating knockout in the eighth round cemented “Tank” Davis’ reputation as one of the best pound-for-pound fighters today. Motivated by his crushing victory, the lightweight champion issued a veiled warning to his next opponent, Lamont Roach.
Tank showed no mercy to Martin in their June 15 clash at the MGM Grand Garden Arena in Las Vegas, Nevada. The World Boxing Association (WBA) lightweight champion dominated the fight from start to finish until he knocked out “The Ghost” at 1:29 minutes of the eighth round.
After this victory, media and fans expected Davis to face one of the top prospects at 135 pounds, Shakur Stevensonor Vasyl Lomachenko. However, earlier this week, it was announced that his next opponent will be WBA super featherweight champion Lamont Roach.
With the fight scheduled for December 14, Tank (30-0, 28 KO’s) has not been slow to provoke his Roach (25-1, 10 KO’s). However, the response from fans has not been as positive as the champion would have hoped.
Davis’s provocations
In a recent post on his Instagram account, Tank Davis published a photo of his knockout of Martin. In the image, he can be seen celebrating the victory, with his rival lying on the canvas. The champion accompanied the image with the caption “December, Houston #TheOne #LongLiveBABYFRANK.”
The clear allusion to their next fight is the latest in the war of words that Davis and Roach have been maintaining since their fight was announced late in September.
“Houston, we got a muthaf*ckin problem” or “You must think I’m one of them regular n*ggas u fought or sum…LoL cut it out meezy,” have been some of the posts that Roach has dedicated to Davis on X (formerly Twitter). In turn, Tank has responded by saying, “I advise you not to talk so much…it can be bad for you. You know that already tho YO.”
Despite the war of words, fans and analysts have questioned Davis’ choice of opponent. In principle, despite being the WBA super featherweight champion, Roach has not shown great punching power, something vital to face a knockout artist like Tank. Another point against him is that Roach will have to gain nine pounds from his natural weight to face this fight.
The responses to his recent post demonstrate the disappointment of fans: “Can you fight somebody that’s gonna actually give you some bump,” and “Yet another [cherry] pick by Tank,” were some of the reactions to Davis’ message.
