by David P. Greisman
When it comes to lineal light heavyweight champion Adonis Stevenson, promoter Kathy Duva of Main Events doesn’t bite her tongue.
That’s because in her eyes Stevenson backed out on a deal to face her fighter, 175-pound titleholder Sergey Kovalev, earlier this year. Main Events had sued Stevenson and several others afterward, dropping the case once Kovalev and Bernard Hopkins signed to fight, as there were no longer the potential financial damages that made such a case viable.
Now that Kovalev has beaten Hopkins to add two more world titles to his collection, Duva believes more than ever that the onus is on Stevenson to prove himself against her guy.
“He’s [Kovalev’s] got three belts. If somebody wants to be the champion in the division, they’re going to have to fight him now,” Duva said. “That’s kind of nice. That’s the argument in favor of collecting the belts. Everybody can duck all they want, and I think Adonis has made himself completely irrelevant, to be perfectly honest. Somebody’s going to beat him. In my view, he is a fringe contender who could lose to absolutely anyone.”
In her eyes, it’s not actually Stevenson who’s important for Kovalev to face, but rather the belt that he holds — for the moment.
“So I don’t know if this is about Adonis Stevenson so much as it’s about someday going after the WBC title, whoever has it,” she said. “We’ll find out.”
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