Teofimo Lopez Explains Why He Doesn’t Want To Fight Shakur Stevenson

Teofimo Lopez says he has no desire to box Shakur Stevenson next time out.

Lopez appeared on It Is What It Is, and was talking about his career and potential fights. One name that got brought up was Shakur Stevenson, but Lopez says he isn’t interested in the bout as he doesn’t want to hand Stevenson his first career loss.

“To be real, just I ain’t trying to give the man his first loss,” Lopez said (via BadLeftHook). “I’ll let somebody else take that, handle that. I seen Shakur lose in the amateurs — ‘cause we all from that class — and it ain’t a good look, man.

“There was this one time especially here in Vegas, National Golden Gloves, 2015, same year me and Jaron Ennis ‘Boots’ won, and Shakur, man, he lost it. He lost it, man. He lost to Ruben Villa and then he wanted to go up to one of the — I think he did — went up to one of the rooftop of the hotel and he wanted to jump off. Yeah. I ain’t trying to have actual blood on my hands. “That Olympic shit, him tearing up and stuff, that ain’t nothing. Like, it’s been bad,” Lopez added.

A fight between Teofimo Lopez and Shakur Stevenson would be a massive fight, but Lopez isn’t interested in it. Instead, he doesn’t care who he fights next as he doesn’t think anyone can beat him at 140lbs.

“It’s just myself. Nobody could beat me, nobody. It’s been shown, it’s been proven. At 140 I’m the only one still remaining, retaining my titles, and at the same time still the king of the division, lineal world champion at 140. That’s why I was thinking I need a competitor. So I was thinking of Gervonta ‘Tank’ Davis or Terence ‘Bud’ Crawford,” Lopez added.

Teofimo Lopez is 21-1 as a pro and coming off a decision win over Steve Claggett. In his career, he has notable wins over Vasyl Lomachenko, Josh Taylor, and Richard Commey among others.