Tim Bradley says Gervonta ‘Tank’ Davis vs. Lamont Roach fight shouldn’t be on PPV because it’s not a big enough one to sell. Bradley argues that Roach (25-1-1, 10 KOs) isn’t well known, can’t punch, and barely beat former Tank knockout victim Hector Garcia last year.
Roach is a pure boxer who has been selected from the super featherweight division by Tank Davis’ management for him to defend his WBA lightweight title against. The fight was originally supposed to take place on December 14th but has been moved to January on a still-to-be-determined date.
Bradley laughs at the gullible Tank enablers, who say that Roach is going to be a tougher opponent for him than his last one, Frank Martin. Tank’s followers would pay to see him fight anyone and believe he’s facing the best. They don’t know much about the sport, so he can fight whoever they’ll pay to see it.
Selling Tank’s poor fights on PPV is ultimately hurting his brand, decreasing his popularity rather than growing it because fans don’t want to pay $75+ to watch him wipe out obscure fighters who have no business being inside the ring with him or anyone at 135.
“Put this dude in with a lion. That’s just me,” said Tim Bradley to Fighthype, about wanting Gervonta ‘Tank’ Davis to finally face a real opponent with talent instead of the lambs that his promoters have been feeding him all these years.
Bradley doesn’t seem to understand what Tank’s career is all about. His original promoters were Mayweather Promotions, and they were all about matchmaking to turn him into a star without risking him against anyone good. He was never put in with Vasily Lomachenko and instead was matched against old, smaller guys like Yuriorkis Gamboa and Leo Santa Cruz. Although Tank is no longer with Mayweather, the blueprint has stayed the same, with him continuing to be matched against exclusively beatable fighters.
“Hell, no, and that’s no disrespect to Lamont,” said Bradley when asked if the Tank Davis vs. Lamont Roach fight should be on PPV. “I know they have history, but Tank is on a different level now. Lamont, he’s on the up and up. He’s kind of reinvigorated himself and reinvented himself. He got a strap [after nine years as a professional].”
How has Roach “reinvigorated himself” when he’s still not facing quality fighters? These are Roach’s last six opponents:
– Feargal McCrory
– Hector Garcia: *Post Tank knockout loss
– Angel Rodriguez
– Rene Alvarado
– Daniel Rosas
– Neil John Tobanoa
Even if you were an ultra-hardcore boxing fan, you likely have never heard of half of those fighters. Roach hasn’t reinvigorated his career. He’s continued to stick with the same formula he had since turning pro, padding his resume.
“He fought some of the same guys [Hector Garcia] that Tank fought and barely escaped with a win. What do you think Tank is going to do to him? We’re talking about styles, ‘Oh, Lamont is going to give him more problems than Frank Martin.’ Stop it. Are you kidding me? Come on, man. That’s an orthodox fighter.
“That’s not a southpaw. That’s an orthodox fighter, a guy that likes to rumble. His heart is going to get the best of him, especially when Tank starts to touch him. They say, ‘Oh, he can get ahead. He can outbox.’ Dude, I see a lot of flaws that Tank can take advantage of. One in particular is the pressure. This dude [Roach] don’t like the pressure.’
“You can say he got a little bit better dealing with the pressure, but he’s a boxer, and he can’t even punch. He can’t hit. How are you going to stop Tank, someone that can take a punch? He ain’t never touched the canvas. Someone that can punch, and he knows, and he smells. He smells you. He has that sixth sense,” said Bradley about Roach.
At 29, Roach hasn’t fought anyone during his career to argue that he’s gotten better at “dealing with pressure.” Roach has been a pro for 10 years, and the only two fighters that are known on his resume are Jamel Herring and Hector Garcia. He lost to Herring in 2019 and just barely edged Hector in 2023. You can’t say that Roach has improved with his ability to hang with pressure because he’s been fighting sub-level fighters.
“That’s what I think of the fight. No, it shouldn’t be on PPV, but it is. It’s Tank. They’ve [PBC] been pushing Tank for a while. He’s been on PPV every time. You know what you’re going to get when you see a Tank fight. People are probably still going to buy it. We’ll see. I think it might do 200 [thousand], 250, depending on how much they talk to build it up.”
The 200,000 buys that Bradley predicts are about right for Tank-Roach because that’s been around Tank’s average since he started doing pay-per-view fights in 2020. Davis had five fights that brought in 200K buys, and the only one that reached 1 million buys was his clash against Ryan Garcia. It did well because of Ryan’s 12M Instagram followers, not because of Tank.
“So the promotion has got to be fire. Again, until Tank knocks out one of those A-fighters, I’m going to continue to say it. Some people believe this dude belongs in the Hall of Fame. Okay, I don’t see it, but I’m not the guy that is going to answer that question. I don’t see it, but a lot of people feel that I don’t belong.”
Roach and Tank aren’t big trash talkers. So, it’s unclear how they’re going to be able to promote this fight on interviews on social media. Without either of them getting someone on their team to do the promoting for them, the marketing of this fight is going to be less than fire.
The only way the event for this fight sells is if it’s placed on the undercard of the David Benavidez vs. David Morrell card on January 25th. Tank-Roach isn’t a big enough fight to be the main event on the Benavidez-Morrell card unless PBC just does it anyway, hoping that fans will focus on the other fight when they decide whether it’s worthy or purchasing on PPV.
“You check my track record, but if you were born in the early 90s, then you don’t even know what time it is,” said Bradley.
