Promoter Eddie Hearn believes he’s signed a doubtlessly “unbeatable” future “international star” together with his latest addition of Shakur Stevenson to his Matchroom promotion.
Excessive-pressure Auditions
With Hearn over-praising Shakur, it places him in a high-pressure state of affairs for his October twelfth match for the promoter towards former IBF tremendous featherweight champion Joe Cordina. For a fighter like Shakur, who has repeatedly turned in lackluster performances in his final three fights, Hearn is placing him in a troublesome place the place he’s acquired to attempt to dwell as much as the glazing.
The 2016 Olympic silver medalist Shakur has signed a two-fight take care of Hearn, which clearly means he’ll should impress to be signed to a profitable long-term deal. These two first fights will likely be auditions for Shakur, the place he’ll have to act entertainingly.
Stevenson will in all probability lose one of many two fights, and Hearn will wash his arms of him, realizing that he’s not who he thought he was. He has a superb newbie model, nevertheless it’s solely efficient towards non-punchers.
We noticed his limitations when he fought the sluggers Edwin De Los Santos and Jeremiah Nakathila. Stevenson was compelled to run all evening in these contests and was booed loudly by the followers for his failure to face and battle.
Shakur isn’t an entertaining fighter except he’s matched towards a gradual, weaker opponent, like when he fought Jamel Herring and Shuichiro Yoshino.
Unfavorable Matchups
- Joe Cordina: A gimme for Shakur’s first of his twp-fight take care of Matchroom.
- William Zepeda: That is the battle the place the wheels may come off for Shakur as a result of he’s acquired a fighter with a high-pressure model that he’s at all times struggled towards. Shakur gained’t be capable to stand and battle Zepeda like he did his final opponent, Artem Harutyunyan, as a result of he has an excessive amount of energy and throws too many photographs. It’s attainable that Shakur will get crushed and be in the identical boat as Devin Haney.
Shakur faces Joe Cordina on October twelfth, with them preventing on the undercard of Artur Beterbiev vs. Dmitry Bivol in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia.
Cordina, 32, is not going to do a lot to extend Shakur’s reputation, regardless of how good he seems to be on this battle. The previous IBF tremendous featherweight champion Cordina (17-1, 9 KOs) misplaced his final battle to 35-year-old Anthony Cacace by an eighth-round knockout on Could 18th.
If the concept was to match Shakur towards a UK fighter from the 130-lb division, Hearn ought to have used Cacace quite than Cordina. It nonetheless wouldn’t make sense if the aim is to show Shakur into a world star,” however a minimum of he can be going through somebody coming off a win as a substitute of a knockout loss.
“I understand how good this child is. He could also be unbeatable. I do know he’s a pound-for-pound star,” mentioned Eddie Hearn to the Matchroom Boxing YouTube channel, glazing Shakur Stevenson’s potential. “There’s one thing about Shakur’s mentality that provides me confidence that he beats all people.
“I believe he’s been massively undersold and needs to be not solely an American famous person however a world famous person,” mentioned Hearn about Shakur.
Hearn sees one thing in WBC light-weight champion Shakur (22-0, 10 KOs) that means he’s on the point of stardom and believes he can deliver that out. I don’t suppose he can. Shakur is simply too restricted as a fighter and goes out of his method to not alternate together with his opponents.
Hearn will appear to be a genius if he can rework Shakur into the second coming of Floyd Mayweather Jr, nevertheless it doesn’t appear doubtless. Floyd was entertaining proper out of the gate when he turned professional. He didn’t turn into boring to look at till later in his profession when he acquired outdated and adopted the safety-first model that Shakur makes use of right now.
His hit-and-run model doesn’t work for constructing a “international star” or perhaps a native, nationwide one within the U.S. If Shakur have been a must-see TV, Prime Rank would have by no means let him get away. They might have paid him a goldmine to remain, however they didn’t; the reason being apparent. He’s boring, and followers don’t wish to watch him.
