Shakur Stevenson wants to fight directly against his WBC #1 contender, William Zepeda, when he returns to the ring from his injured hand from surgery in February or March 2025.
Promoter Eddie Hearn sounded iffy about whether WBC lightweight champion Shakur (22-0, 10 KOs) will face Zepeda (31-0, 27 KOs) directly or fight another fight before then. He says his plans are still the same as Shakur’s to take one or two fights before facing Gervonta ‘Tank’ Davis in a heavyweight fight in 2025.
Zepeda will fight Tevin Farmer at the Riyadh Season event on November 16 at The Venue in Saudi Arabia. It is part of the Latino Night event. It will be Zepeda’s fight against a skilled boxer who is helping him prepare for the moves Shakur will use when they fight next year.
“We would still like to fight that war [Joe Cordina]but the WBC ordered that fight with [William] Zepeda. He fights in November. So, there is a good chance that he can do it [Shakur] he’s going to go right into that fight,” said Eddie Hearn on Fight Hub TV about what Shakur Stevenson’s plans are for his next fight when he comes back from his injured hand in 2025.
That’s a tough matchup for Shakur heading into the fight against Zepeda, coming off a hand injury and two poor performances against Artem Harutyunyan and Edwin De Los Santos. If things don’t go well for Shakur against Zepeda, Hearn will be vilified by the boxing community for allowing Stevenson to take the Zepeda fight after coming off a hand injury.
“I believe so,” Hearn said when asked if Shakur’s hand injury was due to sparring. “Shakur was really looking forward to that fight and going over to Zepeda. The injury was unfortunate, but he has now undergone surgery. Shakur is 27 years old, and is a three-time world champion. It’s a little bump in the road.”
If Hearn gives Shakur a first tune-up, he needs to match him up with someone with Zepeda’s style to help him prepare. Cordina had no use for that purpose.
What Shakur needs is someone like Oscar Duarte or Edwin De Los Santos. Any of these guys would be great for Shakur to be Zepeda. The downside to Shakur going up against a pressure fighter like Duarte or De Los Santos is that he will likely run away from them because he lacks the punching power and physical tools to fight in the pocket against strong, heavy hitting fighters.
“The plan is to get him back to full health and he’s aiming to be back in February or March 2025,” Hearn said. “The plan for me was after those two fights [Cordina and Zepeda] he was going to fight Gervonta Davis. That’s still the same, whether it’s one fight or two.”
Hearn sounds like he wants to take a gamble with Shakur by matching him first against Zepeda and hoping he gets through that matchup to face Tank Davis after that. Unfortunately, there is a very good chance that Shakur loses to Zepeda by knockout.
“If you look at Gervonta Davis’ biggest fights, it’s Shakur Stevenson,” Hearn said.
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