Boxer Keyshawn Davis lost his WBO world lightweight title without even stepping into the ring.
The belt was stripped from him Friday, June 6 after he stepped on the scale.
Davis weighed in at 139.3 pounds, 4.3 pounds over the maximum weight of 135 pounds for his lightweight title defense set for Saturday, June 7 against Edwin De Los Santos, who weighed in at 134.7 pounds.
That led to the cancellation of the 12-round bout, which would have been Davis’ first title defense, in his hometown of Norfolk, Virginia.
Top Rank Boxing, the promoter, announced the cancellation of the fight Friday night on X.
But the event will go on, with a lightweight bout between Abdullah Mason (18-0, 16 KOs) and Jeremia Nakathila (26-4, 21 KOs) to serve as the main event, according to Top Rank Boxing.
Davis (13-0, 9 KOs) had an hour to try to make weight but said he did not intend to try.
“Outgrew the weight,’’ he said during an interview with Top Rank Boxing. “I’ve been making the weight for over four years now. I just outgrew the weight. I tried. I was up late last night trying to make that weight. I woke up early.’’
Bob Arum, the CEO of Top Rank Boxing, which promotes Davis, cast doubt on the fighter’s efforts to make weight.
“You can tell if a guy is trying to make weight and just can’t,’’ Arum told Dan Rafael of Fight Freaks Unite. “You can see that he’s dehydrated. That wasn’t the case with Keyshawn. He never really tried to make 135. That’s my view of what happened.”
Davis indicated he still wanted to fight, as did De Los Santos (16-2, 14 KOs), who would have been the only fighter eligible to win the WBO title. But negotiations apparently fell through.
Davis, an Olympic silver medalist at the Tokyo Games in 2021, won the WBO title in February with a fourth-round TKO of Denys Berinchyk. He said he plans to move up in weight and fight at 140 pounds.