Promoter Bob Arum dismisses Shakur Stevenson’s comments about his belief that he’s been protecting Vasily Lomachenko from him by intentionally not making the clash to keep him from getting beaten.
Arum points out that fighters have a say in why they wish to fight, and it’s not for him to decide.
Shakur’s Frustration
Stevenson (22-0, 10 KOs), the WBC lightweight champion, has been bitter about Arum’s decision to fight IBF champion Lomachenko, who was in the same Top Rank stable.
Shakur felt that Arum should have given him Lomachenko and George Kambosos Jr. after he moved up to the lightweight division in 2023. However, instead of Stevenson getting those two fights at 135, he was matched against these fighters:
– Artem Harutyunyan
– Edwin De Los Santos
– Shuichiro Yoshino
Most fans agree that Shakur performed poorly in his last two fights against Harutyunyan and De Los Santos, showing that he’s a boring fighter who lacks power, is afraid to engage, and doesn’t possess the right ingredient of talent to become a PPV attraction.
“These guys like him don’t realize other fighters have a say in things. He paints a picture – everybody is a puppet but him, like I can make any fight I want,” said Bob Arum to FightsATW, talking about Shakur Stevenson.
“Listening to pals and strangers on the internet doesn’t serve Shakur because those folks have their own agendas and are not versed in the realities of big-time prizefighting,” Arum continued. “He has some good people around him. But the ‘street’ people who talk to him don’t understand.”
Hinting at Departure
Some believe that Shakur’s decision to start hinting about leaving Top Rank soon after he moved up to 135 in 2023 had a negative effect, resulting in them giving him the less popular fighters Yoshino, De Los Santos, and Harutyunyan. We’ll never know for sure.
In hindsight, Shakur should have kept quiet and not openly hinted about wanting to leave Top Rank when his contract was up. Had Shakur kept his mouth shut and praised Top Rank, would he have gotten the fights he wanted?
Lomachenko was open about his lack of interest in fighting Shakur after watching his performance against Edwin De Los Santos, and it was the same with Tank Davis. Shakur hurt his chances for big fights by the way he fought De Los Santos, as he was booed by the fans, and the injury excuses he made after the fight sounded pathetic.
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