Fernando Vargas says, “Nobody knows who Keyshawn Davis is,” and he needs to get his name out there where fans know him before he’ll consider letting one of his three sons fight.
Former two-time junior middleweight champion Vargas claims lightweight contender Keyshawn (12-0, 8 KOs) wouldn’t be recognized if he walked into a restaurant or stadium. Fernando says the fans knew who his 24-year-old son, Amado Vargas, but NOT Keyshawn.
Nobody knows Keyshawn
Top Rank will need to do something drastic with Keyshawn to turn him into a star because the way he did it and the poor matchmaking left him no better than when he turned pro in 2021.
Keyshawn looks like one to washa fighter who failed to achieve what his promoters had expected after winning a silver medal in the 2020 Olympics.
They should throw Keyshaw with one of the sharks like Andy Cruz, and if he loses, leave him as a bad habit. I know it would be bad for Top Rank to admit that they got away with signing instead of the guy who beat him at the Olympics, Andy Cruz, but nobody is perfect.
“The thing is. Nobody knows who Keyshawn Davis is. So, he needs to lift up his name,“, said Fernando Vargas to Fighthype when asked about Keyshawn Davis fighting Amado Vargas.
What Fernando doesn’t say is HOW Top Rank can get Keyshawn’s “name”. I know the answer, but I don’t think they want to take the risk with Keyshawn and watch him lose over and over again. They’re hung up on Edgar Berlanga-style matchmaking, feeding it cans of tomato, hoping that casuals will be impressed enough to become fans.
Fernando is right. No one but ultra-hardcore boxing fans know who Keyshawn is, and they get excited when he fights. There has never been a buzz from the fans when Keyshawn fights because his fighting style is not fun.
Keyshawn’s last four opponents:
– Gustavo Lemos
– Miguel Madueno
– Jose Pedraza: 35
– Nahir Albright
“He and Keyshawn walk into a restaurant. Who are they going to know? Are they going to know Amado or Keyshawn? That’s all I’m going to say. I’m not saying we’re not going to fight because we want to.
It must be millions
“We are down, but they have to make M (millions). Not hundreds of thousands of dollars. M’s,” said Fernando about the Davis brothers needing to bring millions to fight for him to be interested in allowing Keyshawn or any of them to fight their children.
It doesn’t look as promising as Keyshawn becoming a fighter who makes millions for his fights. He’s not another Gervonta Davis, and he doesn’t have the fun style of guys like William Zepeda or Abdullah Mason. If anything, Keyshawn fights more like Shakur Stevenson, but mixes in roughhouse tactics. Think of Keyshawn as a physical version of Shakur.
The problem that 2020 Olympic silver medalist Keyshawn has is that he has fought weak opposition throughout his three-year pro career, and is not driven to fight talented guys like Andy Cruz, William Zepeda or Raymond Muratalla
All the soft matchmaking that Top Rank did for Shakur to take the backdoor route to build him into a star didn’t work. The fans were not impressed because they are not stupid. They can see with their own eyes that Top Rank feeds Keyshawn stiffs.
If Top Rank changed things up by matching Keyshawn against Cruz, Zepeda, Muratalla, or Abdullah Mason, he could gain a following if he won. They don’t do that.
Even now, Keyshawn is maneuvered into a title shot against WBO champion Denys Berinchyk, the weakest of the lightweight belts.
Hype It Up
“You have to hype it up, and you have to be better known. I’m not saying something that’s wrong. Nobody knows who those guys are, unless you’re a boxing leader. Nobody still knows who they are,” said Fernando on to his brothers Keyshawn. “If Amado goes somewhere with Keyshawn, I don’t even know who it is.”
Keyshawn has two brothers who box, Kelvin Davis and Keon Davis, but they haven’t shown much talent. Davis labeled himself and his brothers “DB3” and repeated this monicker a lot, hoping it would stick in the minds of fans. It didn’t.
The welterweight prospect Kelvin is mediocre, and Keon looks so below average. If Keyshawn is hoping that Fernando will bring up his kids with the Davis brothers, he’s kidding himself because it’s never going to happen. No one would care if Fernando did these fights, and he obviously knows it.
“If Amado and him get in the arena, most people will know who Amado is. They won’t know who the hell Keyshawn is,” Vargas said.
