Gary Russell Jr., Gervonta Davis, And The Comical Callout

The last time Gary Russell Jr. won a boxing match, United States COVID patient zero had just been admitted to the hospital with the then-unknown virus. It was February of 2020.

Russell would return to the ring two years later, dropping his WBC featherweight title to Mark Magsayo via majority decision.

Since then, well, nothing. No fights. No known negotiations for fights. Not even rumors of fights.

It’s not exactly surprising that the guy who fought just six times in nine years and just twice in the last five has nothing on the horizon. It IS humorously lacking in self-awareness, though, that he stills does interviews where he’s calling people out and talking about “pulling up to” gyms to fight doubters.

Most recently, the former world champ talked to FightHype.com, lashing out at Baltimore/DC area rival Gervonta “Tank” Davis in a smack-talking interview that would’ve been bad-ass if he were 29 (and active). Instead, it came off as a bit sad as a 36-year-old with nothing in his immediate future, taking swipes at, arguably, the face of American boxing.

“Tank is picking and choosing,” Russell said in reference to Gervonta Davis’ upcoming December bout with super featherweight titlist Lamont Roach. “I always say, ‘It ain’t nothing personal,’ but at some point Tank got to take it personally if I’m saying, I think you’re a bitch because you’re fighting someone that’s not a dog.

“I don’t want to discredit Lamont Roach. I know Lamont Roach. He’s a good guy. I know his father. They’re all cool, but there are levels to everything. Don’t think that you’re fighting someone from the area and making it seem like it’s Baltimore vs. that dog from the area…because that dog from the area is right here [signaling to himself], everyone knows that.

“…At some point, when does pride, when does ego, when does integrity kick in and say, ‘Fuck it, I really do want to see am I as good as I really think I am? I want to challenge the best.’ Where is that at in the sport today?”

“It’s just a money grab type of thing for Lamont. He’ll get a little money, but it’s not the career-defining shit…It’s not a fight [that anyone] will feel as though he’s at risk or Lamont is a threat to him.”

And, yeah, nobody’s really all that enthused about Tank-Roach. Even the die-hard PBC/Tank Davis supporters are struggling to find a crumb of intrigue in this throwaway bout, burning out synapses with the mental gymnastics required to build some sort of salable angle for this pay-per-view fight. “Hey, they didn’t like one another as kids! Here’s my 80 bucks!”

But Russell is not the guy to be bashing Davis for “picking and choosing” opponents when he’s neither picking nor choosing.

The sad thing is that Davis-Russell would’ve been a really intriguing fight and it still has legs, even at Russell’s age. Russell insists, however, that Davis has been avoiding him.

“He’s scared of me,” Russell asserted in that same Fight Hype interview. “I was a world champion before Gervonta ‘Tank’ Davis was even a professional fighter…My skill set completely outweighs him, head and shoulders…He’s never fought or competed against someone that brings what I bring to this table.”

If all this is true and Davis IS ducking him, Russell has made himself infinitely easy to be ducked by fighting about as often as a senior is recommended to have a colonoscopy.

Working under the assumption that Russell still has most of his elite-level hand speed and all of his savvy, he could give Davis a legitimately complicated time. And he’d have a much greater chance at pulling off the upset if he was actually fighting and not just giving interviews about fighting.

Tank Davis is not off the hook in this Russell non-fighting silliness, either. He could’ve tangled with the guy at any point over the last three years or so and it would’ve done bigger business than all but one of his pay-per-view main events to date.

With great [drawing] power, comes great responsibility and the three-ish division world champ has continuously worked around the matchmaking desires of the fans, lucking into one actual blockbuster against an immature and ill-prepared Ryan Garcia last year. The vitriol over his upcoming Roach fight is not entirely about Lamont Roach (we all know pickings were slim when it came to available opposition at the moment), but about five years of Roach-type long shot opponents from a guy with generational skill and ability and exclusive pay-per-view status. Most of the time, Davis and his people come off as more concerned about packing a venue than satisfying the masses– something oddly self-defeating from people aspiring to be in the Tank-is-a-superstar business.

Whether the assessment is accurate or not, the Gervonta Davis-Gary Russell Jr. rivalry comes off as a non-dog fight between a disinterested rottweiler and a barking pit bull running in the opposite direction.

It’s funny in that sense, but not necessarily “ha-ha” funny.