By Chris Williams: Jeff Mayweather says Shakur Stevenson wants Oscar Valdez to come straight at him with his seek & destroy fighting style tonight because he’ll slowly pick him apart.
WBO super featherweight champion Shakur wants to take the 31-year-old Stevenson to school tonight, outbox him all the way through, and get the victory emphatically if possible.
Stevenson (17-0, 9 KOs) is a pure boxer, who thrives on beating aggressive brawlers, and he’s already beaten a fighter with better power than WBC super featherweight champion Valdez (30-0, 23 KOs).
Shakur’s one-sided 12-round unanimous decision last June showed that he has the talent to easily beat a guy that is far and away more powerful and bigger than Oscar.
One gets the sense from listening to promoter Bob Arum, who promotes both fighters that he wasn’t eager to make the Valdez vs. Stevenson fight.
If Arum reluctantly made this fight, you can understand why he isn’t excited about seeing it take place. Valdez is a famous fighter, and if he loses, it could make up things with his career.
Chris Williams wouldn’t give the green light to let Valdez anywhere near a talent like Stevenson if he were promoting him.
“That is exactly what Shakur wants because if he comes at him that way, it’s easy to out-think a guy that is on a mission to destroy,” said Jeff Mayweather to Fight Hub TV in reacting to being told that Oscar Valdez will be on a seek & destroy mission tonight.
“If your mission is to destroy, what is your game plan if that doesn’t happen? Now you’ve got to have a plan B. Shakur is a boxer who, as slick, as he is, he already has a plan B and plan C.
“His boxing plan is going to be, ‘whatever you bring to me, I’m going to be able to outsmart you and outthink you.’ That’s why I lean towards him. I lean towards him slightly.
“I don’t think it’s going to be a walk away or he’s going to do anything spectacular. I just think that he’s going to win the fight, but Valdez is going to make it a very interesting and a great fight.
“When it comes to boxing skills, Shakur has enough skills to pull off a fight like this. If Valdez catches him, it may be an upset, but I do see Shakur winning the fight.
“I think so,” said Jeff when asked if Valdez could attack Stevenson’s body to take away his ability to move around the ring to evade him. “Once you hit the body enough, it’s going to slow you down.
“The other side of the coin is this. Will he be able to land the kind of body shots to slow Shakur down? I don’t know; we have to wait and see. Me as a boxer, I’ve always taken a thinking fighter over a fighter that likes to brawl,” said Mayweather.
