Notebook: Stevenson excited for Newark homecoming defense vs. Conceicao

Muhammad Ali's WBC belt sells for over $6M; new date for Farmer-Bey; Quick hits; Show and tell

Jul 26, 2022

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Unified junior lightweight champion Shakur Stevenson couldn’t be happier to have his first world title fight in his hometown of Newark, New Jersey, next.

“I’m coming home to Newark and I’m back as a unified champion,” Stevenson, a former featherweight titlist, said on Monday. “I’ve always proudly represented Newark, and I’m ready to perform in front of my hometown fans.”

In his second defense, and first since a superb performance in a one-sided decision win over Oscar Valdez to unify the WBO and WBC titles on April 30 in Las Vegas, Stevenson will face Robson Conceicao in the main event of a Top Rank Boxing on ESPN card on Sept. 23 (ESPN, ESPN Deportes, ESPN+, 10 p.m. ET) at the Prudential Center in Newark.

Stevenson, Top Rank officials, some undercard fighters and a variety of special guests, including Newark Mayor Ras Baraka and Seton Hall men’s basketball coach Shaheen Holloway, were on hand at the arena for a news conference to announce the card on Monday, although Conceicao did not make the trip from his home in Brazil for the gathering.

“Shakur Stevenson last fought here in (a nontitle fight in) July 2019. He now returns as a two-time world champion and a unified 130-pound champion,” said Top Rank vice president and New Jersey resident Carl Moretti, who ran the news conference. “He’s on everyone’s pound-for-pound list. He’s one of the best fighters in the world. And when all of us travel, and you run into somebody and ask, ‘Where are you from?’ And you say, ‘Jersey.’ They’ll say, ‘What exit?’ But you know what — we say that it’s going to change to ‘That’s the hometown of Shakur Stevenson.’ That’s how far he’s going to go. And he’s not even close to his prime.”

The southpaw Stevenson (18-0, 9 KOs), 25, a 2016 U.S. Olympic bantamweight silver medalist, showed respect for Conceicao (17-1, 8 KOs), 33, who won the 2016 Olympic lightweight gold medal for Brazil. In his first shot at a world title, Conceicao lost a heavily disputed decision to Valdez in September 2021.

“Robson Conceicao gave Oscar Valdez a tough fight,” Stevenson said. “A lot of people felt like he won, but we’ll see how good he really is when he fights me.”

In a statement Conceicao said, “Shakur Stevenson is an excellent athlete and has my respect for everything he has accomplished. Our paths are crossing, and there will only be one champion. I guarantee the best performance of my life. It will be the fight of the year and a great show for the audience and my Brazilian fans, the ones that never give up.”

Stevenson also had a message for the dozens of kids from the Newark Boys and Girls Club in attendance.

“For all the kids, you’ve got to keep trying to be great,” he said. “Keep striving to be better. I want to be an example for you all. I want to make sure that I do my part. I’m going to come in shape and ready to fight on Sept. 23. I’m going to put on a show for the kids, and for the city of Newark. I want to give you all a hell of a performance. I’m going to do my part, and I’m going to come in shape. I appreciate the support. I’m locked in.”

In the eight-round co-feature, Norfolk, Virginia, lightweight Keyshawn Davis (5-0, 4 KOs), 23, a 2020 Tokyo Olympic silver medalist, will face an opponent to be named. He is coming off an impressive performance in a sixth-round knockout of Esteban Sanchez on the Stevenson-Valdez undercard.

Among the bouts scheduled for the ESPN+-only portion of the undercard:

Brooklyn, New York featherweight Bruce “Shu Shu” Carrington (4-0, 3 KOs), 25, against Jose Argel (8-4, 2 KOs), 27, of Chile, in a six-rounder.
Long Island, New York-born welterweight Jahi Tucker (8-0, 5 KOs), 19, faces Jose Luis Sanchez (11-2-1, 4 KOs), 29, of Albuquerque, New Mexico, in a six-rounder.

Ali’s belt sells for $6.18M

The WBC belt awarded to Muhammad Ali after he knocked out George Foreman in the eighth round of a huge upset to regain the heavyweight championship in the famed “Rumble in the Jungle” in 1974 sold for a shocking $6.18 million (including the buyer’s premium) after extended bidding in the Heritage Auctions event went into the wee hours of Sunday morning.

The buyer was Jim Irsay, the owner of the NFL’s Indianapolis Colts and a noted memorabilia collector.

“After several hours of watching two bidders go back and forth over this belt, this proved to be a battle worthy of the ‘Rumble’ itself," Chris Ivy, Heritage's director of sports auctions, said. “We're just thrilled this extraordinary piece of boxing history — of sports history, of cultural history — found such an exceptional caretaker who will now share it with the rest of the world.”

Irsay indicated on social media after he won that he will add the belt to his collection of historical and pop-culture artifacts that is touring the country. The belt will also be on display Aug. 2 at Chicago's Navy Pier and on Sept. 9 in Indianapolis.

“Proud to be the steward,” Irsay tweeted.

Heritage said there are two of the Ali WBC belts in existence and that they were presented to him retroactively in 1976 for beating Foreman.

The belt was among the costliest pieces of sports memorabilia ever. It trails the $9.28 million paid in May for soccer legend Diego Maradona’s 1986 World Cup jersey that he was wearing when he scored two of the most famous goals of all time and the $8.8 million paid for the 1892 Olympics manifesto in 2019.

The belt sold to Irsay, like many pieces of Ali memorabilia, was part of the contents of Ali’s late cornerman Drew “Bundini” Brown’s storage lockers that were sold at auction in 1988 to pay bills following his 1987 death.

The belt previously sold for $358,500 in a 2016 Heritage auction and later sold for just $127,000.

Farmer-Bey rescheduled

The lightweight fight between former junior lightweight titlist Tevin Farmer and former lightweight titleholder Mickey Bey has been rescheduled.

The 10-round bout is now planned for Aug. 12 at the Findlay Toyota Center in Prescott, Arizona, organizers announced on Monday. It will be available to stream via Redemption PPV.

The bout was initially scheduled for May 21 in Accra, Ghana but due to Covid-19 issues was moved on short notice to take place on the same date at Coca Cola Arena in Dubai, United Arab Emirates. However, the fight was postponed following the death of Sheikh Khalifa bin Zayed Al Nahyan, the president of the UAE.

“This is for our legacy as we're both former world champions looking to end our careers on a high note,” Farmer said. “I want to go down as a true old-school fighter, and I believe Mickey feels the same. That is why we are putting everything on the line. Everything we have ever gotten in our careers has been earned.”

Farmer (30-5-1, 6 KOs), a southpaw from Philadelphia, who turns 32 on Saturday, outpointed Billy Dib to win the IBF junior lightweight title on Dib’s turf in Australia in August 2018 and made four defenses in 11 months in one of the busiest stretches for a titleholder in recent years. In his fifth defense, in January 2020, Farmer lost the 130-pound title by decision to Joseph Diaz and has not boxed since.

Bey (23-3-1, 11 KOs), 39, of Cleveland, won the IBF lightweight title by split decision from Miguel Vazquez in 2014 but never defended it. He is 2-2 since the title win and has not boxed since a split decision loss to George Kambosos Jr. in December 2019 on the Terence Crawford-Egidijus Kavaliauskas undercard at Madison Square Garden in New York.

“Putting this fight together has been a challenge but now we finally have a date and location,” Bey said. “I’m happy that we can bring a world class fight to the fans at an affordable price. It was unfortunate what happened with the fight getting postponed, but everything happens for a reason. This postponement gave us more time to prepare and the fans will be the beneficiaries of a great fight.”

Among the undercard bouts announced were Baltimore super middleweight prospect Lorenzo “Truck” Simpson (11-0, 7 KOs), a 22-year-old southpaw, against Tyi Edmonds (14-4, 9 KOs), 30, of Meridian, Mississippi, in an eight-rounder, and former junior featherweight world title challenger Tramaine Williams (19-1, 6 KOs), 29, of New Haven, Connecticut, against fellow southpaw Jetro Pabustan (31-9-6, 9 KOs), 32, of the Philippines, in a 10-rounder.

Quick hits

The IBF has ordered a light heavyweight title eliminator between Joshua Buatsi (16-0, 13 KOs), 29, of England, and former champion Jean Pascal (36-6-1, 20 KOs), 39, of Montreal. If the fight takes place — and both fighters told the IBF before Monday’s deadline that they are willing to participate in negotiations — the winner will become a mandatory challenger for unified champion Artur Beterbiev. If Pascal and Buatsi can’t make a deal there will be a purse bid. Buatsi, the higher-ranked IBF contender, would get 60 percent and Pascal would receive 40 percent. Buatsi, a 2016 Olympic bronze medalist, is coming off a competitive decision win over former title challenger Craig Richards on May 21. On May 20, Pascal returned from a 17-month layoff due to a suspension for multiple failed tests for performance-enhancing drugs and outpointed Meng Fanlong.

Oscar Rivas’ first WBC bridgerweight title defense against Poland’s Luckaz Rozanski (14-0, 13 KOs), slated for Aug. 13 at a 40,000-seat stadium in Cali, Colombia — a homecoming fight for Rivas (28-1, 19 KOs), who is from Cali but has boxed his entire career out of Montreal — was postponed on Monday, promoter Yvon Michel announced. No reason was given, but Michel added, “Different scenarios are being considered and we will be set on the new date very soon.” The card also was slated to include former longtime undisputed women’s welterweight champion and pound-for-pound queen Cecilia Braekhus (36-2, 9 KOs), a Colombia native who has lived most of her life in Norway, moving up to junior middleweight to challenge Sweden’s Patricia Berghult (15-0, 3 KOs) for her WBC junior middleweight belt.

Junior welterweight Anthony Peterson’s continued comeback has been delayed as the Aug. 6 “Beltway Battles” card he was scheduled to headline at the Entertainment & Sports Arena in his hometown of Washington, D.C., has been postponed until Oct. 1. Peterson (39-1-1, 25 KOs), 37, the younger brother of retired former junior welterweight and welterweight titlist Lamont Peterson (who serves as his trainer), will be fighting for the fifth time since mid-2016. The planned eight-round co-feature between D.C. native and former junior welterweight titlist DeMarcus “Chop Chop” Corley (52-33-1, 28 KOs) and Baltimore’s Mack Allison IV (14-3-1, 10 KOs) is off.

Show and tell

Newly inducted Hall of Famer Miguel Cotto was in his prime during his WBA welterweight title reign. He was rising up the pound-for-pound list and one of boxing’s most popular fighters. For his fifth defense, he was matched with formidable former titlist Antonio Margarito in a fight that I was looking forward to being ringside for as much as any I have covered in my career. In a classic Puerto Rico vs. Mexico showdown, they met at the MGM Grand in Las Vegas and the fight did not disappoint.

As well as Cotto was fighting, Margarito was like a freight train going down a mountain without brakes. He was absolutely relentless and began to batter Cotto as the fight wore on. By the end of the 10th round Cotto looked close to done. In the 11th round, as Margarito smashed Cotto, he took a knee in an effort to gather himself. But when the fight resumed, Margarito continued to blast away and after Cotto, whose face and nose were a bloody mess, went down again, his corner threw in the towel to end the epic fight. Margarito had won the title in a fight he led 96-94 on two scorecards with it 95-95 on the third at the time of the stoppage.

However, Margarito’s win later became forever tainted. In the dressing room prior to his next fight six months later against Shane Mosley, Margarito was found to have illegal pads coated in a plaster-like substance in his hand wraps. His hands were re-wrapped and Mosley proceeded to destroy him via ninth-round knockout. Margarito and trainer Javier Capetillo eventually had their licenses revoked because of the illegal hand wraps in a huge scandal. The incident caused legions to believe — myself included — that “Margacheato” had faced Cotto with illegally loaded gloves that had gotten by the Nevada commission supervisors. Cotto would exact revenge via stoppage in a rematch three years later, when Margarito was basically a one-eyed fighter, but many will always wonder what might have been for Cotto, who was never truly the same after the loss to Margarito in their first fight, which was on July 26, 2008 — 14 years ago on Tuesday. Here is a site poster in my collection.

Stevenson photo: Mikey Williams/Top Rank; Farmer photo: Team Farmer

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