IT will probably amount to no more than a painfully unfunny private joke, but apparently Gervonta Davis, the WBA super-featherweight champion, is booked in to fight Japanese kickboxer Tenshin Nasukawa in April. That’s according to Floyd Mayweather, the joker in the pack.
Though it’s best to forget it ever happened, Mayweather and Nasukawa joined forces to produce a farcical ‘fight’ on New Year’s Eve, for which the American was handsomely paid , and now it seems ‘Tank’ Davis, Mayweather’s mate, wants a piece of the action, too.
Speaking after the 24-year-old’s impressive demolition of Hugo Ruiz to win the WBA super-featherweight title, Mayweather told reporters, “We’re thinking May (for his next fight), if that’s okay with him.
“But he has an exhibition bout with Tenshin (Nasukawa) in Japan in April.
“April is Tenshin and May is the real fight.”
If it’s true Mayweather made a whopping $10 million from sweeping Tenshin off his feet on December 31, it’s hardly surprising others fancy the idea of doing the same. Granted, Davis, 21-0 (20) wouldn’t make anywhere near that reported figure, but he’s a Mayweather man, he’s a current world champion, and he is, like his 41-year-old mentor, clearly motivated by money.
Given all that, maybe it isn’t such a ludicrous idea after all.
For better or worse, there seems to be a surge in bare-knuckle boxing promotions at the moment and one of them, BYB Extreme Fighting Series, are attempting to differentiate themselves by changing the shape of their fighting arena.
Rather than a ring, they will use a Trigon Triangle, a triangle-shaped ring, for their inaugural event on Friday, April 5, at Cheyenne Ice & Event Center in Cheyenne, Wyoming.
The cage will consist of 7-foot high fences, two bevelled corners and a 60-percent tight third corner forming a triangle, totalling 187 square feet. Its usage will mark the first time a professional bare-knuckle event has been held inside a cage.
“When it came time to choose our cage,” BYB Extreme co-promoter Mike Vazquez explained, “we decided to go with a triangle, The Trigon. Not only did we want to distinguish ourselves from boxing and MMA, we wanted a cage that that would promote action from start to finish.
“We’ve accomplished that because a triangle creates the closest quarters in fighting. We want to leave the results of the fights in the hands of fighters not judges. The idea is to increase confrontation by decreasing and modifying the fight area to provide the most confrontational cage in all combat sports. There’s no place to hide. It’s a real fight.”
According to a press release, the April 5 show will feature 10 professional bare-knuckle fights, including appearances from street-fighters seen in the Netflix documentary ‘Dawg Fight’, as well as two mixed martial arts matches.
‘Dawg Fight’, in fact, is name-checked as one of the inspirations behind BYB Extreme and Lights Out Productions, and Dada 5000, the star of the documentary, is a BYB Extreme partner and will serve as one of the colour commentators on their first show.
“The blood, sweat and tears displayed by fighters in ‘Dawg Fight’ is what initially caught our eye and truly fuelled our ambition to create a controlled and organised environment that establishes a platform for the world to witness true brawls,” co-promoter Jose Suris added.
“The evolution that the fight world has experienced in the last 30 years allowed us to take the best parts of professional combat sports – boxing, kickboxing and mixed-martial-arts – to make BYB Extreme the ‘People’s Choice’ for fight fans around the world.”
“People’s Choice” seems an odd expression for a triangular cage homing fights between bare-knuckled and bloodthirsty human beings – oh, and hoping its structure will encourage and enhance the violence – but who are we to argue?
