Bob Arum can boast more experience in the boxing world than most as the veteran promoter has been around the game for decades.
Promoting dozens of huge fights over his career, Arum can be considered to have a high level of expertise when it comes to boxing.
This by no means indicates that Arum goes with popular opinions when asking for his take on things. One example of this is Arum naming Naoya Inoue as the greatest fighter he has ever seen, over the likes of Muhammad Ali and Floyd Mayweather.
Arum recently made another surprising claim in regard to this generation’s ‘Sugar’ Ray Leonard.
Bob Arum says Keyshawn Davis resembles Sugar Ray Leonard
In a 2025 interview with Ring Magazine, Arum offered his opinion on the current WBO World Lightweight title holder, Keyshawn Davis.
The boxing promoter was seemingly high in praise for the 26-year-old fighter as he said, “In my estimation, Keyshawn Davis is this generation’s Sugar Ray Leonard.”
Arum added, “He’s that good. And he fights the same type of style. In other words, he’s very, very quick, has very good defense, but also is an offensive fighter. You know, I’ve always been very high on Keyshawn.”
Davis currently boasts a perfect 13-0 record, having made his debut in 2021. In his last outing, Davis defeated Denys Berinchyk via knockout to claim his first world title.
‘The Businessman’ will aim to defend his world title for the first time on June 7th when he takes on Edwin De Los Santos in Virginia. Arum described the upcoming bout as ‘a really good fight’.
Keyshawn Davis became world champion in almost half the fights it took Sugar Ray Leonard
To compare Davis and Leonard, the two had very different openings to their professional careers.
As amateurs, both men competed in the Olympic Games. Davis was a silver medalist in 2020, and Leonard was a gold medalist in 1976. However, in Davis’ 14th professional fight, he would be able to call himself a world champion.
As for ‘Sugar’, he would not get his hands on such a title until his 26th fight, when Leonard defeated Wilfred Benitez.
However, Leonard was the younger of the two in terms of their age when they won the world title. Defeating Benitez at the age of 23, Leonard was two years younger than Davis was when he became champion.