It was only a few years ago when many expected Davis, Haney, Garcia, Teofimo Lopez and Shakur Stevenson to take over the sport
When Teofimo Lopez Jr. edged out Vasiliy Lomachenko in 2020, it seemed the time of the young stars had arrived in and around the lightweight division. Lopez’s win was the marquee accomplishment for a crop of extremely talented youngsters that also included Devin Haney, Shakur Stevenson, Ryan Garcia and Gervonta “Tank” Davis. Now, nearly four and a half years later, the careers of all of those young stars seems up in the air, and it feels as though none of them have capitalized on their potential, even as some have reached the heights of unified or even undisputed champion status.
Davis was the most recent of the group to step in the ring, fighting to a draw with Lamont Roach Jr. That Davis only managed a draw against a +900 underdog was shocking, but even more shocking was that he was lucky to manage even that result. After being hit by a few Roach punches in the ninth round, Davis took a knee, a by-the-rules knockdown. Instead, the referee decided there was no knockdown after Davis went to his corner to have hair grease wiped from his eye.
Had the knockdown been called correctly, Davis would have suffered the first loss of his career and lost his WBA lightweight title in the process. It was a terrible night for Davis, who has already faced a fair amount of criticism for failing to take on the best available opposition while becoming one of the faces of boxing.
To get to that high-profile status, Davis had to navigate multiple allegations of domestic violence as well as a hit-and-run incident that led to a brief house arrest, only for Davis to violate the terms of that house arrest and serve the rest of his sentence behind bars.
Davis’ most high-profile win is his April 2023 knockout of Ryan Garcia. Both fighters came to that fight undefeated and with considerable fanbases before Davis dropped Garcia in the third round before finishing him with a body shot in the seventh.
Garcia had entered that fight as a crossover star, having built a considerable following of non-boxing fans thanks to his embrace of social media. While many old-school boxing fans resisted the idea of a young, likable fighter using social media, rather than in-ring exploits, to bring fans in, it was a good thing to see a fighter embrace modern technology for more than petty internet beefs.
Unfortunately, the loss to Davis seemed to break something in Garcia. He quickly became an extreme right-wing conspiracy theorist on his social media, claiming to have evidence of elite pedophile rings and the existence of aliens.
Garcia’s odd behavior ramped up ahead of his April 2024 fight with Haney, who had become undisputed lightweight champion before moving up to junior welterweight and capturing the WBC title.
Garcia, a fighter who had previously sought treatment for mental health struggles and talked about issues with alcohol, was repeatedly seen drinking in nightclubs leading up to the fight while also continuing to spout conspiracy theories on social media. After better Haney that he would make weight for the fight, Garcia missed weight by more than three pounds — appearing to drink from a beer bottle as he weighed in — leaving him ineligible to win the title.
Garcia then won the fight with Haney, using his trademark left hook to drop Haney multiple times en route to a majority decision victory in the best performance of his career. While the result was already tainted as a result of missing weight, it was thrown out entirely after it was revealed that Garcia failed a pre-fight drug test for performance-enhancing drugs.
