Devin Haney says he’d be highly motivated to face Vasyl Lomachenko or Gervonta ‘Tank’ Davis next if he doesn’t face former unified lightweight champion George Kambosos Jr. in an immediate rematch later this year in November.
Haney (28-0, 15 KOs) wants the biggest & the best fights after capturing the undisputed lightweight championship last weekend against Kambosos Jr (20-1, 10 KOs) at the Melbourne, Australia.
After weeks of building himself up as a super talent, Kambosos was completely overmatched against Haney, appearing to lose every round of their 12-round contest at the Marvel Stadium.
Two of the judges turned in identical 116-112 scores, while the third had it 118-110. Many of the boxing fans had it 119-109 and 120-108 for Haney.
Kambosos said after the fight that he was going to activate the rematch clause in the contract, but his management need to make the decision because, with the second fight expected to take place in Australia, it might not sell.
“I meet with my team next week to see what’s next. We’re not ruling anything out because obviously, I signed up for the rematch, but we just got to see,” said Devin Haney to MMAHour about whether he’ll be fighting George Kambosos Jr. again in a rematch.
“We want to make the big fights happen. Me and my team are going to go over it.
No, because I’m the undisputed champion, and I’ve got a lot to protect, a lot to be motivated for to stay the top guy in the lightweight division,” Haney said when asked if he’ll have trouble getting motivated for a rematch with Kambosos.
You can make a fair argument that Haney beats Kambosos a second time, even if he’s totally unmotivated for the fight because he’s in another league than him in the talent department.
It seems a shame for Haney to waste a perfectly good fight facing a guy that has no chance of beating him like Kambosos.
The boxing world doesn’t want to sit through another total mismatch when there are better fights out there for Haney against Lomachenko or Tank Davis.
“You never take anybody lightly, no matter who it is. Obviously, the Lomachenko fight, that’s a huge fight,” Haney said when asked what fight would motivate him the most right now.
“All of them get me excited. Gervonta Davis, Lomachenko. Those two are pretty much the top of the list because they make the most sense. All those other guys, I really don’t rate like that.
“Popular, yeah, but I’m chasing legacy. I don’t care about Instagram followers,” said Haney when asked if he’d like to fight Ryan Garcia.
“I want to make the biggest fights happen for my legacy. Instagram, that’s cool and all, but I’m not interested in fighting for followers. I’m into fighting for my legacy for my name to live on forever,” said Haney in dismissing the idea of a fight against social media star Ryan Garcia.
