What many have labeled as the fight that might steal the show on Saturday night, a ten-round lightweight co-feature, will see Top Rank Inc's U.S. Olympic silver medalist Keyshawn Davis (9-0, 6 KOs) taking on the formidable contender Nahir "Woo" Albright (16-2, 7 KOs).
This fight shows a strong belief in Davis as Albright just defeated the 2016 U.S. Olympic lightweight fighter, Karlos Balderas in his last fight. The bout will serve as the lead-in fight to the main event which is Janibek-Gualtieri, a middleweight unification bout, on Saturday, October 14th, live on ESPN. At today's press conference, both Davis and Albright didn't back down from each other.
“If you miss [this fight], you’re going to see it all over social," said Davis confidently. "His [expletive] is going to be on SportsCenter and Sky Sports. He’s really a rookie. I’m going to show it.”
Keyshawn Davis, exuding confidence with each word he stated not giving Albright one ounce of respect in the build-up to this fight. Davis, a part of the super-team run by Brian "BoMac" McIntyre, and training alongside all-time great and legend of boxing Terence Crawford, has good reason to be confident, but now the question will be is he 'too cocky?'
“We ain’t coming here to play," said Davis. "He already knows how I’m coming. You don’t have to be scared to get [expletive] up!”
On the other side, Nahir Albright explained that he should've always been in these types of fights. As he stated his brother, a promising prospect, Quadir, got him ready for this bout and even questioned if Kelvin Davis, Keyshawn Davis' older brother, might have turned down a fight for this undercard. Something that Keyshawn Davis seemed to be revolted by.
“I didn’t really learn anything in my last fight {against Karlos Balderas}. I just showed where I belong. I came out and did what I was supposed to do and got the win," said Albright. “We stepped it up in sparring. I got all types of sparring. I got sparring from my little brother, Quadir Albright, as well. He’s the best junior welterweight coming up.”
Though none of the quotables were great the tenure of the situation was. Albright is not intimidated by Davis and is a solid fighter in his own right. This might be the first fighter in the professional realm that Davis has fought who truly believes that he can beat him. Albright, hailing from Philly, where most talented boxers never make it, seems to have been hardened by the blue-collar town to the point, that he wasn't trying to word-fight Davis on stage. Yet, the tone of Albright is clear - he is ready to fight Davis.
With youth and naiveness with Davis, against experience and possibly a bit of being jaded in Albright. This has the makings of a tremendous fight one that might be comparable to when Teofimo Lopez fought Diego Magdaleno some years back.
