Devin Haney Wants Undisputed Fight with Lopez
WBC world lightweight champion Devin “The Dream” Haney (24-0, 15 KO’s) is chasing the dream of becoming undisputed in the division. Before he can do that however, he must first defeat Yuriorkis “El Ciclon de Guantanamo” Gamboa (30-3, 18 KO’s) this November 7. Throughout the industry, and boxing public, Gamboa is being written off. The popular opinion holds that he is too far past his prime to be a real threat.
RELATED: Devin Haney To Teofimo Lopez: “Let’s Do It For All The Belts”
And the Achilles heel injury that he acquired in his last outing against regular WBA world lightweight champion Gervonta Davis (24-0, 23 KO’s) does not help this changing this perspective at all! Nevertheless, the WBC champ is paying little mind to all this nay saying. In his opinion, Gamboa is still a very live dog who could potentially pose a great many problems.
“Gamboa is an excellent fighter, and I think a lot of people are sleeping on him. They forget that he was Tank’s toughest test! He put on a better fight than Leo Santa Cruz did and everyone is praising Leo Santa Cruz, no disrespect to him. He did go in there and put up a good fight but Gamboa put up a better fight with a torn Achilles.
So, you cannot go in there and think that Gamboa is some slouch or someone who is washed up. He went in there and hurt [Tank Davis], with a torn Achilles so I cannot sleep on him. I know that he’s going to come fight.”
PLANNING THE FUTURE
Provided that he does successfully overcome Gamboa, Haney will resume his quest to become undisputed. The only way to accomplish that feat would be to defeat WBO, WBA and IBF world lightweight champion Teofimo “The Takeover” Lopez (16-0, 12 KO’s). Following his impressive victory over Vasiliy “Hi-Tech” Lomachenko (14-2, 10 KO’s), Lopez briefly spoke with Haney about a would-be future fight.
“It was just a brief conversation, it was nothing too much. I’m not going to say exactly what was said because we spoke like men and it was after his fight. So, I give that respect. What I can say is that we talked about a fight happening. He said go in there and look good against Gamboa and I told him congrats.”
CROWNING A LEGIT UNDISPUTED CHAMPION
When Lopez beat Lomachenko, there was a thick and gloomy controversial cloud that hung over the bout. This was due to the Takeover collecting Hi-Tech’s WBC ‘Franchise title.’ According to the WBC, this made the fight one for undisputed status.
Yet, that makes no sense when Haney holds the actual, and recognized, WBC lightweight belt. Not to mention the Franchise title is not an actual championship and was never meant to be transferable. So, while paying the Franchise trinket zero attention, Haney is still very willing to face Teofimo Lopez.
“I’m not interested in winning a ‘Franchise title,’ that’s not something that I really want to do, but I am willing to fight for undisputed, for all the belts, against Teofimo. But for the Franchise that’s not something that I am looking to do.”
“…at the end of the day he kept saying that he was willing to fight me because he knows that he gains from fighting me. It’s something there that he doesn’t feel right without fighting me for the real undisputed, everything, all the belts. He knows that he is not undisputed without fighting me, so that’s all that just proved.”
By: Bakari Simpson
