Adonis Stevenson vs. Andrzej Fonfara on May 24th at Bell Centre, Montreal, Canada

By Boxing News - 03/24/2014 - Comments

stevenson55By Allan Fox: WBC light heavyweight champion Adonis Stevenson (23-1, 15 KO’s) will be defending his title against #1 WBC Andrzej Fonfara (25-2, 15 KO’s) on May 24th at the Bell Centre in Montreal, Canada. The fight isn’t the one that fans want to see, as they prefer to see Stevenson face WBO light heavyweight champion Sergey Kovalev or IBF champion Bernard Hopkins. But it looks like Stevenson isn’t in a hurry to take the fight against Kovalev, so it could be a year or more before that fight takes place, if ever.

Stevenson makes good money just defending his titles against guys like Fonfara and Tony Bellew, and it’s not as important for him to take on a dangerous opponent that could potentially send him back into the contender ranks where the money is less.

The Stevenson-Fonfara fight could be shown on Showtime rather than HBO, which is good for a lot of fans who already have that cable network. For fans who don’t have Showtime, I’m not sure that a Stevenson v. Fonfara bout is a big enough one for them to subscribe to Showtime. The fight is more of a stay busy mismatch for Stevenson along the same lines as his recent slaughter of Tony Bellew last November.

This will be Stevenson’s third title defense of his World Boxing Council 175lb title he captured last year in June in halting Chad Dawson in the 1st round. In his first defense, Stevenson destroyed former IBF light heavyweight champion Tavoris Cloud by a 7th round TKO win last year in September. Following that win, Stevenson defeated Bellew by a 6th round TKO.

The 6’2” Fonfara hasn’t had any real tough opponents during his career other than a handful of past their best fighters like Glen Johnson, Byron Mitchell and Gabriel Campillio. In 2008, Fonfara was blasted out in the 2nd round by Derrick Findley. He never attempted to avenge that defeat, and has beaten mostly obscure opposition apart from his wins over Johnson, Mitchell and Campillio.

Whether the Stevenson vs. Fonfara fight ends up on Showtime or HBO is hardly worth bothering to worry about because the isn’t a competitive one and will be duplicate of Stevenson’s mismatch against Bellew. One can’t blame HBO is they’re not interested in the fight, and the same with Showtime. It’s a mismatch. Showtime and HBO should hold off on televising Stevenson’s fights until he faces Hopkins or Kovalev.



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