By Steve Kim

As Curtis Stevens faces Patrick Teixeira on Saturday night as part of the Saul Alvarez-Amir Khan pay-per-view undercard from the T-Mobile Arena in what is a pivotal middleweight battle, he does so with a new trainer - the respected John David Jackson, who's best known for working with unified light heavyweight titlist, Sergey Kovalev.

Jackson says of the hard-hitting Stevens,"With Curtis I have a tremendous puncher. I have a kid with boxing ability it just hasn't been brought out in him, yet."

"He can fight, it's just that unfortunately today in boxing, a lot of these trainers aren't teachers, half of them never boxed. We're never taught correctly how to fight."

Stevens, who has dabbled with the BKB, was last seen in a boxing ring in October of 2014 when he was out-pointed by Hassan N'Dam in what was an IBF eliminator. A win versus the active Brazilian could go a long ways in re-establishing the native of Brooklyn as a middleweight player.

"My job is to make him a better, more complete fighter. Be more aggressive in his attack but break his opponents down more," said Jackson of Stevens, who has a tendency to be a bit too judicious in letting his hands go.

"He has the power but he has to be able to set that power up correctly, not be so deliberate. I'm not going to change his style. He got there by power but get him to deliver that power differently, in a more surprising way to make the fights easier."

Steve Kim is the news editor for BoxingScene.com.