By Miguel Rivera

Top Rank's CEO Bob Arum does not view Puerto Rico's Christopher Diaz as an easy opponent for Olympic silver medal winner Shakur Stevenson.

The contest will be staged as part of the ESPN Pay-Per-View undercard to the welterweight battle between WBO welterweight champion Terence Crawford and challenger Amir Khan.

Diaz's countryman, Félix "Diamante" Verdejo, will open up the card when he takes on Bryan Vásquez in a WBA final eliminator for a world title shot at 135-pounds.

Diaz will have a golden opportunity that could also boost his career to new heights if he upsets Stevenson, who is being groomed as a superstar by Top Rank.

"We are very excited about this card at Madison Square Garden. We have two prominent Puerto Rican fighters who will be on the pay per view. Christopher Diaz will fight with the phenomenon Shakur Stevenson, and the return of Felix Verdejo against the former world champion Bryan Vasquez," Arum said to Antolín Ríos.

Arum does not believe that Diaz is in the same critical situation that Verdejo finds himself at the moment. Diaz suffered his first career defeat in July 2018, when he fell by unanimous decision against Japanese fighter Masayuki Ito, when facing him in search of the vacant WBO world title at 130 pounds.

"Shakur is an excellent fighter, but Christopher is very experienced. He's going down to what I think is his best weight, which is 126 pounds and it could be Christopher's experience against Shakur. If he beats Shakur Stevenson, nobody will want to see [Stevenson] again. But if he loses [to Stevenson], there are other fights for him in the future," Arum said of Diaz, whom he believes would remain an attractive boxer for the business and with opportunities to climb.