Promoter Sampson Lewkowicz revealed last Saturday night to the media that he’s negotiating a fight between lightweight contender Edwin De Los Santos and WBO 135-lb belt-holder Keyshawn Davis. Lewkowicz says he’s hopeful of making the fight.
Pitbull Missed
That’s not the big fight that Keyshawn (13-0, 9 KOs) had talked about wanting to have against Isaac ‘Pitbull’ Cruz and Gervonta Davis, but he’s not popular enough to get those kinds of fights.
Keyshawn had naively bragged about how his capturing the WBO lightweight title from Denys Berinchyk on February 14th was going to open the doors to a stampede of big names wanting to fight him.
Davis sounded like the character George from the novel Mice and Men, in which he talks about having a dream farm and living off the “fat of the land.” It’s just a fragile dream with no hope of happening. Keyshawn’s dreams of the WBO title changing his life are just as hopeless and pathetic as George’s.
Untouchable Fears
De Los Santos (16-2, 14 KOs) hasn’t fought in two years since his narrow 12-round unanimous decision defeat against Shakur Stevenson in 2023. Given that long layoff, it’s questionable whether De Los Santos can even make weight for the clash against Keyshawn.
Top Rank likely wouldn’t let the southpaw knockout artist De Los Santos anywhere near Davis if he were active and looking good. The active version of Edwin that fans saw obliterate Jose ‘Rayo’ Valenzuela in three rounds in 2022 would be one of the tainted untouchable classes avoided like the plague.
Keyshawn has already shown that he’s chinny in his fight against Nahir Albright, and he’s been matched carefully ever since that fight. Putting him in with a dangerous puncher like De Los Santos is a risky move by Top Rank. He’s like the equivalent of an old, buried, rusted landmine that could explode if the trigger mechanism is still intact after years.
There’s no way on Earth that Top Rank would let that version of De Los Santos fight Keyshawn because they’re trying to build him into their next star. They’re using the same careful matchmaking with the Norfolk, Virginia native Davis as they’d done with Edgar Berlanga when he was still with the company.
Last Updated on 03/24/2025
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