NEWARK, New Jersey – Shakur Stevenson was surprised by a post-fight message from Devin Haney that was delivered to him in the ring Saturday night by ESPN’s Bernardo Osuna.
Stevenson thinks Haney will beat Vasiliy Lomachenko convincingly next month, but he thought Haney would give up his four lightweight titles and move up to the 140-pound division for his following fight. Haney insisted after Stevenson’s sixth-round stoppage of Shuichiro Yoshino at Prudential Center that he will remain in the lightweight division following a victory over Lomachenko and would want to face Stevenson in what would be a fascinating bout between unbeaten American lightweights.
The 25-year-old Stevenson hopes Haney means what he says because the Newark native would prefer to fight for the IBF, WBA, WBC and WBO 135-pound championships in one fight, not just the WBC belt. Stevenson (20-0, 10 KOs) became the WBC’s mandatory challenger for one of Haney’s four titles by beating Tokyo’s Yoshino (16-1, 12 KOs) in the main event of ESPN’s three-bout broadcast.
“Tell him come on,” Stevenson told a group of reporters after he stopped Yoshino. “If that’s what he wanna do, I mean, I don’t know why would he watch [the Youshino fight] and say that? I never seen Devin Haney really even hurt anybody before. He ain’t really got the punching power, so if he watched that he could tell that I could punch. I don’t know what would make him say, ‘Let’s do it.’ Maybe he’s just a competitor. Maybe I just gotta respect that.”
Haney (29-0, 15 KOs), of Henderson, Nevada, is consistently listed as more than a 2-1 favorite to beat Lomachenko (17-2, 11 KOs) in their ESPN Pay-Per-View main event May 20 at MGM Grand Garden Arena in Las Vegas. Stevenson respects Lomachenko’s skills, but he thinks Haney will handle his smaller 35-year-old opponent relatively easily.
“He’s gonna smoke Lomachenko,” Stevenson said. “But he gonna be drained coming back to fight me, and that’s gonna be ugly.”
There are business obstacles that could prohibit Haney-Stevenson from occurring if Haney conquers Lomachenko.
Haney’s three-fight contract with Bob Arum’s Top Rank Inc., which promotes Stevenson, expires after the Lomachenko clash. Becoming a free agent again would enable Haney to return to work with Eddie Hearn’s Matchroom Boxing and DAZN, which streamed six straight Haney fights from 2019-2021.
Regardless, the 24-year-old Haney is considered one of boxing’s best technicians. The Oakland native dominated Australia’s George Kambosos Jr. (20-2, 10 KOs) in each of his last two fights, both 12-rounders, and is the sport’s undisputed lightweight champion.
Stevenson still suspects that he’ll surprise plenty of people by beating Haney thoroughly if he gets that opportunity later this year.
“I think it’s gonna be easy work,” Stevenson said. “I think I’m gonna smoke him. I think I’m gonna shock everybody by smoking him, making it a real easy fight. Everybody’s gonna be like, ‘Damn, dude is who he say he is.’ ”
Keith Idec is a senior writer/columnist for BoxingScene.com. He can be reached on Twitter @Idecboxing.