By Allan Fox: WBC light heavyweight champion Chad Dawson (31-2, 17 KO’s) and challenger Adonis Stevenson (20-1, 17 KO’s) traded barbs earlier today in their press conference to hype their June 8th fight at the Bell Centre, in Montreal, Quebec, Canada.
Stevenson, 35, is moving up in weight from 168 to challenge the taller and the more experienced Dawson for is World Boxing Council 175 lb. title,
Dawson seemed like he wanted to have it be a nice calm press conference but Stevenson got him riled up when he said: “The one young guy you fought, Jean Pascal, beat you up in Montreal.”
Dawson didn’t take that insult too well and he immediately fired back to Stevenson saying: “You’re not young; you’re an old 35. You’re outdated already. Who are you? Nobody knows who you are. I had to Google you to find anything about you. You’re lucky to be getting the opportunity. Grown-ups don’t have Mohawks. My three-year-old son has a Mohawk.”
In the last comment, Dawson was making reference to Stevenson’s Mohawk haircut. Dawson is right about Stevenson not being well known. He’s well known in Canada and fights in front of big crowd there, but in the United States, Stevenson is only known to the hardcore boxing fans that follow the sport closely.
Casual boxing fans in the U.S don’t have a clue who Stevenson is, and Dawson is doing him a big favor in agreeing to take this fight because the U.S boxing public isn’t pushing for this fight. Also, there are higher ranked contenders than Stevenson such as Tony Bellew, Isaac Chilemba and Jean Pascal that Dawson could have fought instead of the 35-year-old Stevenson.
This is difficult fight to predict a winner because Dawson is coming off a one-sided 10th round stoppage loss to WBA/WBC super middleweight champion Andre Ward from last September, and he never looked good in that fight.
We heard the excuse that Dawson was weight drained in coming down in weight to take that fight at 168, but the way that Ward dominated Dawson it seems pretty obvious that the outcome would have been virtually the same had the fight taken place at 175 instead.
Stevenson, a southpaw, has been able to get over his opponents with his southpaw stance and hand speed. However, Dawson is also a southpaw, so Stevenson won’t have an advantage in this fight for area. He’ll still be faster and the harder puncher compared to Dawson, but it won’t help Stevenson if he can’t land his shots.
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