Shakur Stevenson’s Post-Fight Revelation: “I Don’t Plan on Getting Hit No More” After Battering

Shakur Stevenson says he’s returning to his former style of fighting after taking a beating in his ‘win’ over William Zepeda on July 12th. The New Jersey native Shakur (24-0, 11 KOs) complained that he “took more punishment than usual” with his decision to fight the volume puncher Zepeda (33-1, 27 KOs) in a one-on-one manner. He doesn’t want that to happen again.

Stevenson’s Defensive Return

If WBC lightweight champion Stevenson is going to just run around the ring, as he showed in his fights against Edwin De Los Santos, Jeremia Nakathilia, and many others, he brings no value to Turki Alalshikh’s Riyadh Season events.

“Hell, no. I want to put on performances, but I also took more punishment than usual. So, I want get back on my boxing, make sure I don’t take a lot of punishment in there. So, nah, I don’t plan on getting hit no more,” said Shakur Stevenson at the post-fight press conference after his victory over William Zepeda on July 12th.

So there it is from Shakur. He says he’s returning to his former style of fighting, which he will revert to his Jerry-esque form. There will no longer be entertaining fights. It’ll be him moving, using his hit-and-don’t-get-hit style of fighting.

Less Engaging Fights Ahead

Stevenson’s revelation can’t make Turki Alalshikh happy because he’s paying him millions to entertain the fans. He’s already said he will no longer “support” fighters that don’t engage, and choose to turn their fights into “Tom and Jerry” spectacles. Turki might want to consider ending his support of Shakur and leaving him off his future fight cards after his announcement that he’s returning to his non-entertaining style of avoiding being hit in his fights.

Unblocked Shots Concern Stevenson

“It was sometimes he would get stuff through. That’s what I want to take away, and it’s always things you can work on and get better,” said Shakur about his failure to block the nonstop punches that Zepeda was throwing.

What is Shakur talking about when he says, “Sometimes he would get stuff through?” Zepeda’s body shots were getting through his guard nonstop. He wasn’t blocking any of Zepeda’s body shots. They were constantly landing.

Stevenson looked like a human piñata, getting battered with punches to the chest, sides, and breadbasket in every round of the fight. Of the opponents Zepeda has fought in the last three years, Shakur took the most amount of punishment because he had no offense to keep Zepeda honest. The occasional potshots that Shakur was landing were nowhere near the match of the rain of punches to the body from the Mexican destroyer.

Shakur was worried mainly about blocking the punches to the head, especially after he was staggered by a right hand from Zepeda in round three.

The issue is that the judges were only focusing on headshots for scoring purposes and completely ignored the bodywork that Zepeda was doing. If they had scored the fight professionally, Zepeda would have won because he landed more punches and had the harder shots.