Former WBO lightweight champion Keyshawn Davis has spoken about the disastrous fight week in June when his bout with Edwin De Los Santos fell through after the champion failed to make weight.
Davis came in 4.3lbs over the weight for his homecoming title defense at Scope Arena in Norfolk, Virginia, and speaking to Ariel Helwani, a remorseful Davis spoke about how things started to unravel. He also said he was looking for a career “restart.”
Davis said it was not through ill-discipline that he missed weight and that he had been sacrificing.
Davis had told his team ahead of his title victory over Denys Berinchyk in February, a dazzling fourth-round stoppage win, that that would be his last fight at 135lbs because making weight had become so tough, but then other avenues were opened and he was told about the possibility of a homecoming defense, make the weight one more time, staying active and then moving on.
“I guess that was the wrong call,” said Davis, 13-0 (9 KOs).
The 26-year-old said he did not conduct himself like a professional, and he apologized to both former champion Timothy Bradley and Sampson Lewkowicz for his behavior in fight week.
Having known how hard it was to make weight for Berinchyk, Davis said he had not taken any liberties with his weight and he had his “most disciplined camp.”
“I would say fight week, it was like, ‘Damn, this weight ain’t coming off like it usually do…’ The weight literally was not coming off, and I was skinny as hell. Dehydrated. So I’m just like, ‘Man it is what it is. I just can’t get it off.’”
In his prior fight, Davis was on the wrong end of a fighter not making weight when Gustavo Lemos came in heavy but was still blown out by Davis.
“I was super cocky, arrogant, thinking he [De Los Santos] would just take the fight anyways, because I did it at one point in time, with the Lemos fight, and it [against De Los Santos] is a bigger event and there’s no way he cannot fight. He’s a fighter. All that’s going through my head. I didn’t come in overweight on purpose. That’s not what champions do. That’s not what I do.”
Davis heard his opponent still wanted to fight but the Dominican's team withdrew De Los Santos. Days after the bout, De Los Santos split from manager Sampson Lewkowicz, and Davis said he would have happily paid a stiff penalty for De Los Santos to go ahead with the fight.
“Whatever he asked for, I wanted to do,” said Davis. “I’ve got to do anything in my power to make him feel comfortable.”
Davis came off aloof in fight week, and that is something he also finds regrettable.
“That shit backfired on you so now people think you [I] don’t care. That really fucked me up… I was hurt,” he added.
Davis said he would only return when he is mentally ready, and that the Virginia commission was still looking into the backstage skirmish between Davis, his brothers and Nahir Albright, who defeated Keyshawn’s sibling Kelvin on the fight night Keyshawn was due to headline.
Davis was deeply apologetic and said he had spent time with God, and he wanted to do better for himself and his son.
“I’m not happy, when I look back on all this stuff that happened, but it was necessary, because now I get to reflect on who I was becoming,” said Davis. “You was becoming a person, if I’d kept on winning, I would have become a person that I didn’t want my son to see. I hate what happened happened, but what happened definitely changed me to a better person.”
Asked about a possible return, Davis said he would be back at some point – possibly in a year – but does not know when. He has not been back in the gym since, although he has been doing his roadwork.
“I’ve just got to get Keyshawn together right now,” he said.
