Boxing Challenge: Stevenson leads boxing renewal

Photo: Mikey Williams-Top Rank

Boxing's rebound from Covid-19 began as part of ESPN/Top Rank's two cards per week for the next five weeks promotion with one of the more talented boxers in the game as its headliner.

While the card lacked competitive matches, that was to be expected from the first card and the upcoming cards appear to be more competitive and evenly paired as the series moves along.

Give Top Rank and ESPN lots of credit for pulling this off with the safety requirements involved with keeping everything and everyone as safe as is possible and that also will improve as more and more cards are held.
The broadcast was a little slow, but that is going to be a way of life for a while.
Without standby swing bouts and the ring needing to be cleaned after every fight, time is going to need to be taken and there will be downtime involved.

In the only boxing challenge match, WBO featherweight champion Shakur Stevenson cruised past unheralded Felix Caraballo via sixth-round knockout, as Stevenson finished Caraballo with a strong left to the body.
Stevenson only allowed Caraballo to land eighteen punches before the end of the one-sided drubbing that saw Stevenson score an earlier knockdown from a punch to the body in the first round.
Stevenson is expected to try to work out an agreement for a unification bout with IBF champion Josh Warrington or could decide to move to junior lightweight (where this non-title bout occurred) for possible fights with WBC champion Miguel Berchelt or perhaps Oscar Valdez, should Valdez win his fight with Berchelt.

In the boxing challenge, I scored three points for the Stevenson win, earning an extra point for the round of the knockout with Ramon Malpica picking up one point for the win.
I extended my boxing challenge lead to 48-41.