DETROIT – Two days before they shared a ring with each other at Little Caesars Arena, Danielle Perkins and Che Kenneally took to a ring separately at Detroit’s Downtown Boxing Gym.
And it was there, during the media workouts, that Perkins had a strong feeling that Kenneally was outmatched. Perkins had already suspected as much given Kenneally’s lack of experience against a true challenge. And then she watched Kenneally’s workout.
“I saw the media workout. I was like, ‘If what she did in the media workout was not a joke, then we’re gonna be in for a short night,’” Perkins told BoxingScene hours later, soaking in the still-fresh victory and the fact that she had just won the WBA light heavyweight title from Kenneally via sixth-round technical knockout.
Perkins was drinking a soda while standing in the bar area of the fight hotel, where others from the promotion and the boxing industry were letting loose after the end of Sunday’s event headlined by the rematch between Claressa Shields and Franchon Crews-Dezurn. Among the congratulations Perkins received was one from someone else who reigned at 175lbs, former champion Jean Pascal.
But back to that media workout: What was it that Perkins spotted?
“Lack of agility [or] athleticism. Very stiff on responses. Very delayed responses to the mitts. Slow bringing her hands back after she throws punches,” said Perkins, who is now 6-1 (3 KOs). “She’s strong. I know it doesn’t feel that way, but when you’re looking at the fight, I was like, ‘Oh, OK, she been sparring with somebody who's been giving her a little pressure.’ But she's not accustomed to someone taking that and not shying away.”
The first round went decently for Kenneally, who handled Perkins’ pressure just fine, landing a right hand as Perkins came forward on two separate occasions, and another later on when her own back was against the ropes.
“The first round of the fight, I wanted to kind of see what her lateral movement or even, like, adjusting to the height difference, her reaction to pressure punches,” Perkins said. “Once I got the feedback, we went back to the corner. We started working on making sure that she had to be as agile as possible. And also kind of hand play to make sure that she didn’t know where shots were coming from. But also being aware that at no point, really, am I going to step away from taking her punches once I was able to get the pressure there.”
Perkins’ movements in the fourth and fifth rounds resembled the “Drunken Master” stylings of former fighter Emanuel Augustus. Perkins beamed when this reporter brought up that comparison.
“Yes! I love Emanuel Augustus,” Perkins said. “At one point, I stepped through with the Drunken Master. I had a good time, because I wanted her to throw punches.”
It had seemed from press row as if Perkins wanted to frustrate Kenneally, to make her come forward and set her up for counter shots.
“I kept doing half-steps, but also like showing her a half-step away from where I was actually going, so she would come to where I needed her to be,” Perkins said. “So every time she would feint, I'd half-step in the wrong direction, so she thought I was fading out instead of going back. So a half-step, half-step, boom, land the uppercut. Boom. Half-step, half-step, check hook. And then when she finally would come over, I would take the half-step out and just land the two.”
The end came shortly after Kenneally rushed in and Perkins moved backward to evade her. Kenneally then tried a jab and got caught with a big left. Amid the exchange, Kenneally tried to throw a left and a right, only for Perkins to drop her with a huge right hand. Kenneally crumpled to the canvas. She beat the count, but the referee didn’t like what he saw and stopped the fight one minute and 45 seconds into the sixth.
This was a huge win for Perkins, a 43-year-old Houston resident who lost a year ago to Shields in a bout for the undisputed heavyweight championship. Beyond that, there is the fact that Perkins long ago saw her professional basketball career come to an end when she was badly injured in 2008 after a car hit her in New York City.
According to a 2020 article by boxing writer Sean Nam, Perkins suffered “a cracked skull, strained neck, dislocated shoulder, and damaged nerves from the waist down. [...] For the first three months of her so-called recovery, she was effectively paralyzed.”
Beyond the injuries – and because of them – Perkins was worried about how she was going to be able to make a living.
“Basketball was what I thought was my journey,” she told this reporter in our hotel bar conversation. “Boxing wasn’t in the cards.”
After taking up boxing, Perkins won a bronze medal at heavyweight in the 2018 world championships and the gold in 2019. She turned pro in 2020 and had two bouts, outpointing the 2-0-1 Monika Harrison and knocking out the 1-0 Princess Hairston. Perkins then outpointed Harrison again in 2021 before what became a three-year layoff. She returned in March 2024, stopped the 3-2 Timea Nagy, won a unanimous decision over the 2-1 Christianne Fahey, and then lost to Shields
“Before the walkout [against Kenneally], I was like, ‘This is my dream. This is my dream. My dreams are coming true. I cannot believe it,’” Perkins said. “This is my dream, and I’m grateful. Because this is not a sport to easily penetrate. You know, being a female co- feature on a Claressa Shields card, you don’t know how many people would love to have this opportunity.
“And then for a world title and to get the knockout, people are doing their meditation in the morning on things like this. This is like someone’s affirmation. Like, you know, getting paid to box on a high level. There are kids right now who don't have shoes for boxing, who don’t really have three-course meals or even winter coats. I'm blessed.”
The victory and what it meant had not really registered yet, she said.
“I'm like, ‘Oh yeah, no, I’m a world champion. I guess I’ll go have a Diet Coke at the bar,” Perkins said.
Days before the bout, Perkins had spoken of her desire to unify world titles at light heavyweight if she were to win the WBA belt from Kenneally. Hours after the bout, she was asked who she would like to face.
“Raquel Miller, Shadasia Green, Savannah Marshall,” Perkins said.
Miller, 13-0 (6 KOs), hasn’t fought in nearly three years but signed with Jake Paul’s Most Valuable Promotions this past November. Green is the unified IBF and WBO super middleweight titleholder, as well as the Ring Magazine and lineal champion by virtue of her split decision victory last July over Savannah Marshall. And Marshall is a former undisputed champion who beat Franchon Crews-Dezurn for that throne in 2023.
But in terms of unification bouts at 175lbs, there’s Sarah Scheurich, 7-0 (4 KOs), a 32-year-old from Germany who defeated Lani Daniels for the IBF light heavyweight belt in December.
“I’ve seen her fight plenty of times. She's actually pretty good,” Perkins said. “We're about relatively the same size, so I think that would be a good fight.”
Crews-Dezurn also has two super middleweight belts and spoke after her rematch loss to Shields of being willing to move up or down in weight for fights.
“I really haven’t thought about fighting Franchon. Franchon is a pain in the butt to fight,” Perkins said. “Man, she is durable. She can take a punch. She’s crafty. It'd have to force me to level up. She's also [formerly] an undisputed champion. She'd be great for my resume. I don’t know if I’d be good for hers. You know, I’m like, she’s like, ‘Why would I risk it?’”
David Greisman, who has covered boxing since 2004, is on Twitter @FightingWords2. David’s book, “Fighting Words: The Heart and Heartbreak of Boxing,” is available on Amazon.
