Lightweight titlist Devin Haney is outlining his holiday wishlist, and it’s headlined by a pair of potential mouthwatering fights for 2021.
“My next [fight] will be Teofimo Lopez because that would be for all the belts of course and I would want to be undisputed champion of the lightweight division, and then I would say Gervonta Davis,” Haney told the “Last Stand Podcast” with Brian Custer.
“I think Teofimo Lopez does want to fight me, I think Teofimo actually, really wants to fight me. Maybe he doesn’t really like me or whatever the case may be but I think he really does want to fight me. Ryan Garcia not so much.”
The 135-pound division also features the likes of former champion and pound for pound kingpin Vasiliy Lomachenko. Jorge Linares, Javier Fortuna, Richard Commey, Luke Campbell and Robert Easter all present themselves as premier B-side options as well.
Everyone, however, wants to see Haney, Lopez, Davis, Garcia and Lomachenko all mix it up in an unofficial tournament, facing each other one at a time in whatever order is needed.
The WBC recently made it clear that Haney will have two mandatories due in 2021 – Fortuna and the winner of Saturday’s eliminator between Garcia and Campbell.
The 22-year-old, Las Vegas-based Haney (25-0, 15 KOs), who is coming off a one-sided drubbing and unanimous decision over Yuriorkis Gamboa, had the following message to share with his future foes.
“At the end of the day, when I get in the ring with these guys we shall see,” said Haney. “If I don’t have the punching power, why aren’t these guys quick to get in the ring with me, I got a belt. It’s the most money they’ll make up to date in their career, so if they really feel like I was such an easy fight why aren’t these guys so quick to beat me, to stop me from running my mouth, to get me out of there. They’re not, in reality the proof is in the pudding.
“If I’ve fought so many easy guys and if I was so easy, come get me, if you really feel like that. If you really feel like that then you would come get me, beat me, and take my belt and get the easy money and then walk off with an easy night if that’s how you really feel. If I was so easy these guys would be begging for me and they’re not.
“My skill set, my work ethic, my skill set is just different from those guys and in my fights it has shown. I dominate my opponents, I make them look inexperienced. I pitch shutouts so badly that people criticize my opponents because I don’t lose rounds, I don’t lose any seconds of the fight.”
Manouk Akopyan is a sports journalist, writer and broadcast reporter. He’s also a member of the Boxing Writers Association of America and MMA Journalists Association. He can be reached on Twitter, Instagram, LinkedIn and YouTube at @ManoukAkopyan, via email at manouk[dot]akopyan[at]gmail.com or on www.ManoukAkopyan.com