Shawn Porter says he watched Shakur Stevenson spar and came away from the experience, seeing similarities to Floyd Mayweather Jr. in how Stevenson neutralized the offense of his training partners.
Porter feels that he believes that WBC lightweight champion Shakur (23-0, 11 Kos) will shut down the offense of William Zepeda and show his “greatness” in their fight on the July 12th card at the Louis Armstrong Stadium in Queens, New York.
Porter’s Mayweather Comparison
“We’ve seen this with Floyd Mayweather. Some fighters have the ability to stop you from doing what you do,” said Shawn Porter to the Ring Magazine YouTube channel, talking about being impressed with watching Shakur Stevenson neutralize the offense of sparring partners.
Neutralizing sparring partners from throwing punches doesn’t necessarily translate to Shakur being able to beat Zepeda or any of the high-caliber lightweights, such as Andy Cruz. Porter didn’t mention the names of the sparring partners, and he also didn’t say if Shakur was running around the ring.
“I’m not saying Shakur is Floyd Mayweather. He has a lot of similarities to Floyd. I saw that in the gym. I’m a firm believer he’s going to be able to do that to Zepeda. Just completely turn off what Zepeda does. Zepeda’s job is not to allow him to do that. Easier said than done.”
Sparring: No Championship Metric
Shakur dominating sparring partners proves nothing. If the fighters were world-class, they wouldn’t be working as helpers in the gym. Porter knows that, but it sounds like he’s bucking for a job with Turki Alalshikh. Beating up a sparring partner is common for top-tier fighters. Now, it would be a different story if Shakur were neutralizing Zepeda, Andy Cruz, or Floyd Schofield in sparring.
“Zepeda is young, and he’s hungry. The guys I saw Floyd fight and turn those guys off, they were a little bit older than Zepeda. I expect Shakur to turn it all off and show his greatness.”
We all saw the weak opposition that was being shoveled into the ring for Floyd Mayweather Jr. to fight at the tail end of his career. So, Porter is either ignorant of the low-level fighters Floyd was padding his record with at the end in seeking to break Rocky Marciano’s 49-0 record, or he’s being disengenuous. He can’t be that in the dark, could he?
At the end of his career, Mayweather swerved fighters that would have likely beaten him and ruined his chances of breaking the Marciano record. Comparing Shakur to Mayweather makes no sense unless we’re viewing it from the angle of Stevenson being a fake, creating an artificial record to try to secure a massive payday against Gervonta Davis.
Shakur’s Weak Resume
Beating Zepeda won’t prove “greatness” in Shakur. It’ll prove that he could beat a fighter that many fans believe was beaten twice in a row against Tevin Farmer. Stevenson is going to have to do a lot more to live up to Porter’s glazing, because his resume at 135 is weak beyond words. He’s fought four times at lightweight against this lesser bunch:
- Josh Padley: The electrician was brought in by promoter Eddie Hearn as a replacement opponent. He was selected over unbeaten southpaw knockout artist Jadier Herrera (17-0, 15 KOs).
- Artem Harutyunyan: A light hitter coming off a year layoff and a loss to Frank Martin.
- Edwin De Los Santos: The only good but far from great opponent Shakur has fought since moving up to 135.
- Shuichiro Yoshino: A painfully slow, easy-to-hit fringe contender that Shakur fought in his debut at lightweight.
Lightweight Division Kings
To prove that Shakur is great, he’s going to have to run the gauntlet through these six fighters:
- Andy Cruz: The best fighter at 135
- Floyd Schofield
- Gervonta Davis
- Abdullah Mason
- Raymond Muratalla
- Jadier Herrera
Last Updated on 07/02/2025
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