Andre Dirrell says Shakur Stevenson needs to improve his game and learn to fight in the pocket before facing Gervonta ‘Tank’ Davis. Dirrell wants Shakur to take a few fights to develop, and learn how to fight in the pocket before facing WBA ‘regular’ lightweight champion Tank Davis (30-0, 28 KOs).
Hearn’s Hasty Plans: A Payout Deal?
Shakur’s new promoter, Eddie Hearn, is pushing him to a fight against Tank after signing the New Jersey native to a two-fight deal with Matchroom.
The tank battle should be seen as simply a cash out type deal. Hearn wasn’t going to wait three fights for Shakur to learn on the job to iron out the flaws Dirrell observed in his game.
Matchroom promoter Hearn wants the Tank fight to take place in mid-2025 because if Shakur waits three more fights, he will likely be beaten by one of the contenders.
In his three fights at 135, Shakur has shown that he does not belong in this weight class because he is too weak in the strength department and cannot stand his ground. It would end badly for Shakur if he tried to follow Dirrell’s advice to improve his game because he would be vulnerable.
In Shakur’s last fight against light puncher Artem Harutyunyan, he was getting nailed with shots to the head and body when he stood in the pocket. Although he dodged a lot of the shots, Shakur still gets hit regularly by Harutyunyan, and you can only imagine what the results would be if it was Tank Davis doing the hitting.
Retired former IBF interim 168-lb champion Dirrell feels that Tank Shakur can walk down to knock him out quickly due to his lack of power. However, he can scenario where Shakur (22-0, 10 KOs) can win if it goes 12 rounds, and he stays on the move the entire fight against Tank.
“Shakur just needs to fix some things and learn how to fight in the pocket,” Andre Dirrell said social mediaand says that Shakur Stevenson needs more development before he faces WBA ‘regular’ lightweight champion Gervonta ‘Tank’ Davis next year.
“He has already shown he can; he just didn’t fire that last fight (against Artem Harutyunyan). If I were Shakur, I’d test the waters with a few opponents and then jump in with Tank. He found time for it,” Dirrell said.
Hearn’s short-term strategy
Hearn’s mad rush to make the fight between Shakur and Tank makes it seem obvious that he doesn’t see Stevenson as having the talent to go undefeated for much longer, even with soft matchups.
He almost lost to Edwin De Los Santos. He looked like pure venom being booed out of his hometown arena for his last fight against Artem Harutyunyan last July at the Prudential Center in Newark, New Jersey.
If fans have seen Shakur’s fights against punchers Edwin De Los Santos and Jeremiah Nakathilia, it is clear that he will be inconsistent against Tank Davis. It will be like watching a wolf chasing a rabbit; the outcome would be predetermined.
However, Shakur can’t make it to the Tank Davis fight because the second fight of his two-fight deal with Hearn will be against William Zepeda. That guy has too much offensive firepower for Shakur to handle. Even if Shakur learned how to fight in the pocket the way Dirrell wants him to, he’s not going to last more than three rounds fighting Mexican slugger Zepeda.
If Shakur loses that fight or turns in another performance like against De Los Santos and Nakathilia, there will be no interest in a clash with Tank. Even with Hearn’s ability to market non-competitive fights, under those circumstances he would try to smuggle a clash between Shakur and Tank.
Some believe Hearn’s reasoning for signing Shakur to a short two-fight contract is that he knows he will be worthless to him once Tank Davis vaporizes him. With a short-term deal, Hearn can avoid the time-consuming and expensive task of rebuilding Shakur’s career after Tank destroyed him.
Shakur’s low popularity: a problem for rebuilding
Depending on how badly Tank beats Shakur, it may be impossible for even a smart promoter like Hearn to bring him back. If Shakur had the popularity of British fighter Anthony Joshua, it would be worth it to Hearn to match him against cream puffs for a few years to bring him back from defeat.
He did quite well with Joshua, but that guy has a huge built-in fan base in the UK, and they’re willing to pay to watch him fight low-level opposition. UK fans still support fighters after they lose and are proven to be shot or never as good as people originally thought, as in the case of AJ.
In the US, Hearn can’t do that with Shakur because he’s not popular and will be even less so after Tank Davis comes through with him. Fans won’t stick with Shakur after losing to Tank because he’s not entertaining to watch, and he’s never beaten great opposition to win his three-division world titles.
Stevenson’s future: uncertain after tanking
Shakur is this era’s version of Adrien Broner, winning divisional world titles against marginal opposition. In Broner’s case, he was at least entertaining to watch, and his press conferences were pure 24k gold before he got lazy and tired.
If Hearn tried to do the same rebuild with Shakur after Tank Davis cut him down, fans wouldn’t be buying tickets to see him fight. Hearn obviously knows what he’d be up against trying to restore himself to brand new status after a loss to Tank, hence the short-term deal. If you believe in a fighter, you sign them to a long-term deal, but not if you doubt it.
Putting Shakur’s fights on PPV, as he is doing with his match against Joe Cordina on October 12th, would be a disaster unless he was facing a popular fighter like Devin Haney or Ryan Garcia. Those guys aren’t going to want to help Shakur after losing to Tank because there’s no upside because he’s not a PPV attraction.

