NEW YORK – Keyshawn Davis’s handlers understand that the ease with which he beat Juan Carlos Burgos on Saturday night both helped and hurt the elite lightweight prospect’s cause.

The 23-year-old Davis, who won an Olympic silver medal in 2021, impressed an expansive viewing audience on ESPN. The Norfolk, Virginia native also made himself more of a high-risk, low-reward proposition for established lightweight contenders.

Davis (7-0, 5 KOs) still expressed optimism during his post-fight press conference early Sunday morning regarding getting ranked 135-pound opponents to fight him in 2023.

“It should be fairly easy,” Davis said. “You know, if they wanna fight, then we can make the fight happen. Especially at 135, it’s a lotta competition out there. And, you know, a young, up-and-coming guy like me, with only seven fights, they shouldn’t be scared to fight me, right? So, fight me. You know, it shouldn’t be that hard.”

Davis’ fast hands, intelligence, power and speed made it very hard for Burgos to be even remotely competitive during their eight-round fight at Madison Square Garden. Though Davis didn’t become the first fighter to knock out the three-time championship challenger in his 18-year, 45-fight professional career, he buzzed Burgos (35-7-3, 21 KOs) several times and battered the Mexican veteran throughout a bout he won by shutout on all three scorecards (80-72, 80-72, 80-72).

“I was comfortable in round one,” Davis said. “After round one, I came back to the corner and said, ‘Oh, he got nothing for me.’ And coach Red [Spikes] was like, ‘Yeah, you right.’ So after round one, I already knew I had it in the bag already, honestly. I was just trying to find a way where I could stop him.”

Davis’ next fight figures to be a 10-rounder. He was scheduled for eight rounds against Burgos only because ESPN televised four fights and needed two of those bouts to be eight-rounders for the purpose of saving time on the broadcast.

“Unlike other things that happen, we know when these three guys are gonna fight again,” Carl Moretti, promoter Top Rank’s vice president of boxing operations, said of Davis, heavyweight Jared Anderson (13-0, 13 KOs) and junior middleweight Xander Zayas (15-0, 10 KOs) during the press conference. “We have a good idea of when. We’re not sure who they’re gonna fight. The bad thing is when you get exposure like this and look like this, you have to force yourself up to be a mandatory. You know, because I don’t predict that our phone [is] gonna ring Monday, ‘Hey, I wanna fight that guy Jared Anderson. Or Keyshawn. Get me Zander.’

“You know, those calls don’t really come in. So, it’s OK because they’re young guys and it’s a progression. So, we know when they’re fighting, we have a good idea where they’re gonna fight. I don’t know who that’s gonna be yet. … We don’t need to worry about that right now. Everybody can enjoy the holidays. But we know what’s gonna happen [in 2023] for these guys.”

Keith Idec is a senior writer/columnist for BoxingScene.com. He can be reached on Twitter @Idecboxing.