After dominating at featherweight and super featherweight, Shakur Stevenson is finally making his long-awaited move to lightweight in a little more than a week. Stevenson (19-0 with nine knockouts) will face fellow unbeaten Shuichiro Yoshino (16-0 with 12 knockouts), and he is a massive favorite by the boxing betting odds against the current WBO Asia Pacific lightweight title holder. Promoters are already talking up an eventual showdown between Stevenson and either Devin Haney or Vasyl Lomachenko, but Stevenson does have to keep his unblemished record and get by Yoshino before the talks of a megafight can come to fruition.
Two-division world champion Shakur Stevenson will take on Shuichiro Yoshino at the Prudential Center in Newark, New Jersey on Saturday, April 8, 2023. This will be a partisan crowd since Stevenson hails from Newark, and the former Olympic silver medalist will look to put his best foot forward. The main card will start at 10 p.m. ET on ESPN+ with the main event getting underway approximately two hours later.
When: Saturday, April 8, 2023
Where: Prudential Center, Newark, New Jersey
Why: Lightweight contenders bout
Shakur Stevenson vs Shuichiro Yoshino Betting Odds
Shakur Stevenson -2200
Shuichiro Yoshino +916
If you are unfamiliar with betting on boxing, a $2200 bet on Stevenson would return $100 if he were to win this fight, so it makes more sense to bet him to win by decision or knockout in order to get better odds. A $100 bet on Yoshino would return $916 at this price if he were to get the win.
As the fight nears, there will be decision betting too. You will be able to bet on whether the fight is decided by KO, TKO, or decision, and you can bet on which boxer will win the fight in that fashion as well.
Shakur Stevenson vs Shuichiro Yoshino Preview
Shakur Stevenson has been a crown prince of boxing since he was a teenager. Stevenson won gold at the Youth Olympic Games and the Youth World Championships back in 2014, and he won the silver medal at the 2016 Summer Olympics in Rio de Janeiro.
Given his youth and relative inexperience, Top Rank was very cautious with him early in his career. Stevenson faced nothing but no-names in his first 10 fights, and he had no trouble running his record to 10-0. However, he had to prove himself against Christopher Diaz and Alberto Guevara before challenging Joet Gonzalez for the WBO featherweight belt in October 2019. He was successful in that endeavor, and he won a 12-round unanimous decision against Gonzalez to claim the belt.
There was no time for Stevenson to rest on his laurels as he quickly made the move from featherweight to super featherweight after claiming his first world title. He once again cut his teeth against a few fighters before taking on Jeremiah Nakathila for the interim WBO super featherweight title. Stevenson won that bout by unanimous decision, and he won the full title four months later with a 10th round TKO of Jamel Herring. He successfully defended that belt and added the WBC and The Ring super featherweight titles with a win over Oscar Valdez last April, and he defeated Robson Conceicao in his last bout (although Stevenson busted tape).
Shuichiro Yoshino has only boxed in Japan so far in his professional career. His first 14 fights were at Korakuen Hall in Tokyo, but he has become a big enough name that his last two bouts took place at the Saitama Super Arena. Yoshino was part of the co-main event in the second-to-last Gennady Golovkin fight last April, as he made his second successful title defense of the WBO Asia Pacific lightweight belt. He knocked out Masayoshi Nakatani in his most recent fight in November, so he does have translatable power at this level.
Both of these fighters have a reach of 68 inches. Stevenson is the deserved favorite, but there may be some value in Yoshino at the current price. While Yoshino hasn’t fought anyone of note, Stevenson hasn’t fought anyone that could seriously challenge him yet, so Yoshino could surprise especially with Stevenson making his second move up in weight.
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