- Keyshawn Davis vs Nahir Albright II — Scope Arena Norfolk, tonight, DAZN (Top Rank's first big show on the new deal).
- Davis 14-0 (10 KOs); Albright 17-1, with the 2023 MD verdict that was overturned to a no-contest after Davis's positive marijuana test still the talking point.
- Luke's pick: Davis by stoppage between rounds 7 and 10. The hometown story, the volume, and the Albright body shot vulnerability all line up.
Why This Rematch Has Bite
This is more than a hometown homecoming. The 2023 fight at Madison Square Garden's Theater finished with Davis taking a majority decision and Albright walking out furious — and within a fortnight, that result was turned into a no-contest after Davis's adverse VADA finding for marijuana. Davis kept the win in the eyes of most. Albright never accepted it. Then Davis won the WBO lightweight, dropped a stinker against Edwin De Los Santos, was stripped, moved up to 140, and the redo with Albright has been hanging in the air since.
Twelve rounds tonight at 140lbs. No belt on the line, but a clear winner on the Top Rank schedule for a WBO 140 shot in October — the kind of thing that matters more than a belt at this stage. And it's Davis's first fight in his hometown as a professional.
The Round Read
Davis is the fresher boxer. He started week looking proper — finally hit 140 first time at the weigh-in (or near enough — 140.2, stripped 140.1, drank some water, back on the scales bang on the limit), and his fight-week presser was the calm version of Keyshawn rather than the chippy version. The chippy version is the one that gets him in trouble. The calm version is the one that puts Albright through the back door of round eight.
Albright will do what he did first time. He'll be the busier man in spurts. He'll throw the jab from a step out of range, he'll dig the left hook to the body in close, and he'll make Davis throw at angles the home boy isn't comfortable with. The thing he won't do — and this is the bit the rematch storyline gets wrong — is win a clean three minutes of any round. Davis won most of those clean minutes in 2023 and that's how Top Rank lined up the matchup again.
Where Davis Wins
The body. Albright shipped a heavy left hook to the liver from Jeremiah Milton last September and was wobbled badly in round five before clawing it back. Davis throws the cleaner left hook to the body in the division. If he doubles the jab and digs to the liver in rounds five through eight — which is the Brian "Bomac" McIntyre game plan you'd write for this fight on the back of a fag packet — that's where the stoppage comes.
Where Albright Could Steal It
Volume in the first three. If Albright wins rounds one through three on volume and stays clean of the early body work, and if Davis falls into that flat-footed bracelet-puncher rhythm he gets into when he's frustrated, we get a twelve. We get a card. We get a fight that some people will tell you Albright won. The corners will know. The judges might disagree.
Luke's Pick
Davis by stoppage round 8 or 9. Body shot. Albright goes down to a knee, gets back up, looks fine, ships a follow-up flurry, referee jumps in. The hometown crowd lifts the roof off. Top Rank do their post-fight October announcement, probably for Subriel Matias or the winner of Berinchyk and Diorella Joselito.
If you're betting the stoppage round, take 7-9. If you're betting the method, take TKO body. If you're betting the upset, you know better than that.