Shakur Stevenson Abandons His Defensive Style at Ring III
July 14, 2025
By Steven X
Shakur Stevenson fought this past Saturday night at Louis Armstrong Stadium in New York City against Mexico’s William Zepeda, defending his 135-pound WBC lightweight title. Leading up to the fight, Shakur spent time defending himself from critics who say his fights are “boring” and that he runs.
His Excellency, Turki Alalshikh, may have been considered Shakur’s friendly critic when he tweeted at Shakur on July 5, “We have a surprise for @ShakurStevenson on Saturday, a ring that shrinks as the fight goes on. Shakur says he is ready to deliver a beatdown of William Zepeda, and I know the Mexican is prepared for the challenge of the biggest fight of his life.” Of course, Turki was joking, since a shrinking ring has never been done before, and no commission would approve such a thing. Shakur simply responded to the tweet saying, “See y'all Saturday.”
Turki’s poke at Shakur comes after his tweet about no longer supporting “Tom and Jerry” fights. He specifically said during the Canelo-Crawford presser, “We will not have [Tom & Jerry fights] anymore. We will have in this fight and our next fights a bonus for a KO.” Previously, to those remarks, he tweeted indirectly about the Canelo-Scull fight and future similar fights, where the Cuban was very elusive and Canelo showed an inability to cut off the ring, “From this point on, I don’t want to see any more Tom and Jerry-type boxing matches where one fighter is running around the ring and the other is chasing him. We can no longer support these kinds of fights with Riyadh Season and The Ring. We want to support fighters who leave it all in the ring and fight with heart and pride!”
These remarks sparked off fierce debates in the boxing community about boxers who move and use the whole ring to their advantage versus those boxers who are more planted and may not be able to cut off the ring as well. Is it the responsibility of a more fleet-of-foot fighter to make the fight easier for a planted fighter? Of course, references to Shakur’s defensive first fighting style being boring especially relate to his fight for the then vacant WBC lightweight title against Edwin De Los Santos on November 16, 2023. Shakur Stevenson defeated Edwin De Los Santos by unanimous decision, 115-113, 116-112, and 116-112. The judges' scores don’t reflect the fact that, according to BoxingScene.com, De Los Santos landed 40 punches on Shakur, the lowest ever in a 12-round fight in 38 years.
Critics of Shakur accused him of being afraid to be hit and “running” during the fight. Well, this past weekend, Shakur spent a lot of his time on the ropes against Zepeda and seemingly getting hit at will. He threw his defense to the wind and exchanged with William. In this co-main event, Stevenson defeated William Zepeda with scores of 119-109, 118-110, and 118-110. He went on to improve his record to 24-0 (11KOs), and Zepeda’s record now changes to 33-1 (27KOs). The fight was more competitive than the scores suggest and closer to 116-112. But, of course, what counts is the official scorecards of the judges at ringside. Shakur’s counter-punching was accurate, and his defense was Mayweatheresque, shoulder rolling against the ropes the way Floyd Mayweather did versus Marcus Maidana happened to do in their first fight. He did not “run” as his critics like to say.
Even with Shakur’s stylistic defense, Zepeda landed 153 power punches on the champion— no other opponent has landed that many shots on him in his whole career. He was there to be hit throughout the fight. From the first round, Stevenson was on the ropes while Zepeda was throwing punches to his head and body, while Shakur countered. The two traded in the second round as well.
The fight really took on this tone until Shakur started pulling away in the later rounds, landing at will against Zepeda. His offense was more accurate than William’s, and he was throwing harder shots as Zepeda started to fatigue in the later rounds.
Shakur Stevenson’s words during their promotion came fully realized, “Zepeda, I remember everything you just said. Oh, Shakur won’t exchange with me. Shakur don’t have the balls like Tevin Farmer. Remember these things bro so when we get in that motherfucking mix right there, and I’m beating your ass, that’s gonna be, don’t be surprised… don’t be surprised. That’s all I say.”
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