Shakur Stevenson wants to go straight into a fight against his #1 WBC challenger, William Zepeda, when he returns to the ring from his surgically repaired injured hand in February or March of 2025.
Promoter Eddie Hearn sounded doubtful about whether WBC lightweight champion Shakur (22-0, 10 KOs) will go straight into a fight against Zepeda (31-0, 27 KOs) or take another fight before that. He says his plans are still the same for Shakur to want him to take one or two fights before facing Gervonta ‘Tank’ Davis in a mega-fight in 2025.
Zepeda will fight Tevin Farmer in a Riyadh season event on November 16 at The Venue in Saudi Arabia. This is part of the Latino Night event. This will be a refresher fight for Zepeda against a smooth boxer that helps prepare him for the moves Shakur will use when they fight next year.
“We still want to do that fight (Joe Cordina), but the WBC ordered that fight with (William) Zepeda. He fights in November. So, it’s very likely that he (Shakur) will go straight into that fight,” said Eddie Hearn. Fight Hub TV on Shakur Stevenson’s plans for his next fight when he returns from his injured hand in 2025.
It’s a tough matchup for Shakur going straight into a 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 booed by the boxing public 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 the result of sparring. “Shakur looked forward to that fight and moved on to Zepeda. It’s an unfortunate injury, but now he’s had the operation. Shakur is 27 years old, and a three-division world champion. It’s a small bump in the road.”
If Hearn does give Shakur a tune-up first, he needs to match him up against someone who has a similar style to Zepeda to help prepare him. Cordina was useless for that purpose.
What Shakur needs is someone like Oscar Duarte or Edwin De Los Santos. Either of those guys would be ideal for Shakur to get ready for Zepeda. The downside to Shakur first fighting 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 fighters who hit hard.
“The plan is to get him back to full health and target that return for February or March 2025,” Hearn said. “The plan for me after those two fights (Cordina and Zepeda) was to fight Gervonta Davis. It’s still the same, whether it’s one or two fights.”
Hearn sounds like he wants to gamble with Shakur by matching him against Zepeda first and hopes he gets through that match to face Tank Davis next. Unfortunately, there is an excellent chance that Shakur will lose to Zepeda by knockout.
“If you look at the big mega-fights for Gervonta Davis, it’s Shakur Stevenson,” Hearn said.
