Eddie Hearn’s two-fight deal for Shakur Stevenson sees him fight non-Matchroom fighter William Zepeda in his second fight in early 2025.
Shakur’s first fight of his two-fight deal with Matchroom is against Joe Cordina, a British fighter who is not popular in the US and is coming off a knockout loss. That fight hurts Shakur’s marketability more than it helps.
Deliver the Zepeda battle
The question is whether Hearn will deliver on the Golden Boy-promoted Zepeda (31-0, 27 KOs), as he will have to work with promoter Oscar De La Hoya to make that happen.
De La Hoya recently complained about WBC lightweight champion Shakur (22-0, 10 KOs) lacking the “confidence” to fight entertainingly to make him a marketable fighter.
Despite not having a title, Zepeda is a more popular fighter than Shakur, and he doesn’t need him. It’s the other way around. Zepeda is No. 1 with all the sanctioning bodies at lightweight, and he will make more money against the WBA’s ‘ordinary’ champion, Gervonta ‘Tank’ Davis.
Shakur left Top Rank because they couldn’t give him the big fights, but if Hearn can’t either, he could end up in the same boat.
“Shakur looks at it (Jaron Ennis’ introduction to Eddie Hearn) and says, ‘I want that kind of attention. I didn’t get it with Top Rank,” boxing expert Chris Algieri told Probox TV YouTube channel about what prompted Shakur Stevenson to sign with Eddie Hearn’s Matchroom.
Will history repeat itself?
Welterweight champion Jaron ‘Boots’ Ennis has only fought once since signing with Hearn: against 36-year-old David Avanesyan. If Hearn can’t deliver the champions at 147 for Boots, her next fight could be against Karen Chukhadzhian. Whether Hearn can work his magic with Boots or Shakur is doubtful, as dealing with different promoters and networks isn’t as easy as he thinks.
Also, when you have too good fighters like Boots, other fighters and promoters don’t want to face him; in Shakur’s case, he’s a boring runner who isn’t even. There’s nothing to be gained for fighters to face Shakur, especially when they could potentially lose a decision against a guy who hits and runs all night.
Shakur naively believes that fights will suddenly be delivered to him, which were never there before when he was at Top Rank. This may not be the case.
“Can he (Hearn) secure the fights that really matter? The fights couldn’t Top Rank because that was Shakur’s biggest gripe,” Algieri said. “Can Eddie get him the big fights, or was Eddie just the guy talking at the negotiating table to make everyone think they could get the big fights?”
Hearn’s handling of Andrade’s career
If Hearn can’t start a fight with Zepeda for Shakur in early 2025, it will be interesting to see who he does get. It would look bad if it was another British fighter that American fans weren’t familiar with. Hearn would match Shakur like he did with Demetrius Andrade when he was at Matchroom.
Instead of setting up fights with the killers at 154 to increase Andrade’s popularity, Hearn matched him against Luke Keeler, Maciel Sulecki, Liam Williams and Jason Quigley. He then wondered why Andrade’s popularity had not increased.
“The two-fight deal that’s there (for Shakur with Matchroom). The second fight is with Zepeda, who is with Golden Boy,” Algieri said. “Eddie and Golden Boy, I don’t know how many fights they’ve had over the years. But Golden Boy and Bob (Arum) and Bob and Oscar (De La Hoya) make fights.
“They can have some crossover battles. It’s probably easier to make that fight through there. But when you have fighters in opposite promotional situations, it’s hard to make these fights. Is Eddie the guy who can jump through the lines?” Algieri said.
Hearn could potentially start a fight with Zepeda for Shakur if he offers the right deal, but it’s not a sure thing. If he tries to broker a deal for Shakur to fight Tank Davis next year, he’ll be in trouble. That probably won’t happen without Shakur signing with PBC.
Crossing lines
“To some extent he is, because now we’re talking about Turki Alalshikh, and Eddie seems to have a very close connection with Turki, and they fight together a lot. So, potentially, you can get that crossover appeal,” Algieri said.
Turki can certainly help Hearn get the fight with Zepeda, but probably not Tank Davis if PBC isn’t on board. I don’t know if Tank is excited to fight Shakur, especially if he looks bad against Zepeda and Cordina.
“They announced a few days ago that Shakur was fighting Cordina. Well, Cordina is with Eddie. So it makes sense that Shakur now signs with Eddie. He has a two-fight deal. We will see what Eddie can really deliver on what was promised,” said Algieri. “Let’s see what Eddie can deliver, because with Jaron Ennis he certainly hasn’t yet.”
