By Scott Gilfoid: Having failed to get IBF super middleweight champion Carl Froch to face him in the ring, #1 IBF 168 lb. contender Adonis Stevenson (19-1, 16 KO’s) will be moving up in weight to face WBC light heavyweight champion Chad Dawson (31-2, 17 KO’s) in a fight that will be taking place in June, according to Steve Kim.
Nemzetisport.hu is reporting the fight will take place on June 8th, provided that the 35-year-old Stevenson get past journeyman Darnell Boone (19-20-3, 8 KO’s) this month in their fight on March 22nd at the Bell Centre in Montreal, Canada.
Boone already knocked Stevenson out 2nd round three years ago, and Stevenson wants to avenge the fight. Normally, that would be pretty much a given that Stevenson would beat someone like Boone, but Stevenson likes to slug and that’s not something you want to do against the powerful Boone.
Dawson, 30, had been hoping to get a rematch against former WBC light heavyweight champion Jean Pascal, who beat Dawson by a 11th round technical decision three years ago in August 2010, but Pascal has opted to face former IBF super middleweight champion Lucian Bute on May 25th in a battle between two Canadian based fighters.
If Stevenson can get past Boone, then he’s a good bet to beat Dawson if he can land one of his big shots. However, if Stevenson is unable to KO Dawson then he’ll lose that fight because Dawson will have a huge height and reach advantage over the 5’10” Stevenson. Adonis is a good fighter, but he’s no Andre Ward, and he doesn’t have great boxing skills.
You’d have to think that Stevenson will lose his #1 IBF ranking at 168 by challenging Dawson. However, it really doesn’t matter because it’s not as if Froch or Mikkel Kessler is going to ever fight him. I can see Froch vacating his IBF strap in order to avoid fighting Stevenson, and Kessler certainly won’t fight him either. Kessler has an excuse not to ever fight Stevenson just based on the fact that he’s not ranked in the top 5 by the WBA.
By the time Stevenson does get ranked, if that was something he wanted to do, he’d be nearing 38. It’ll take years for him to get ranked by the WBA, and like I said, I don’t see Kessler agreeing to fight him. Froch and Kessler will never voluntarily fight a slugger like Stevenson. As such, Stevenson might as well move up to 175 for the fight with Dawson because it isn’t as if anyone will fight him at 168. I mean, Andre Ward would if Stevenson got ranked high enough by the WBA and WBC.
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