Stevenson-Karpency is unacceptable

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Adonis StevensonWBC light-heavyweight champion Adonis Stevenson (26-1, 21 KO’s) announced earlier Monday that he will be fighting No. 9 ranked WBC contender Tommy Karpency (25-4-1, 14 KO’s) on September 11th in Toronto, which will be telecast by Premier Boxing Champions on CBS.

This will be the second consecutive time that Stevenson will fight on a PBC on CBS card – this following his most recent bout in April against former WBC super-middleweight champion Sakio Bika – who he defeated by unanimous decision.

The 38-year-old Stevenson will be taking on a fighter who defeated the man that propelled him to world champion status in Chad Dawson in his latest fight, which he won by split decision.

Karpency is an underrated fighter. He has a good jab, good speed, and stellar combination punching abilities. In the fight against Dawson, he also displayed an adept ability to block shots, although he had the tendency to get a little careless on the inside.

Dawson has lost three of his last four fights, so unfortunately for Karpency, he’s never going to get the credit he earned for out-boxing a former World champion.

At 29 years of age, Karpency is running out of time if he wants to be a World champion. His biggest infirmity is his chin. He’s been knocked down by IBF title contender Karo Murat, stopped in seven rounds by WBC contender Andrzej Fonfara, and was dominated from start-to-finish by Nathan Cleverly.

For Stevenson to fight Karpency is unacceptable. The WBC No. 8 ranked contender is the undefeated Thomas Oosthuizen of South Africa. And no, you can’t pull the Al Haymon excuse on this one.

On April 7th of this year, Oosthuizen signed with Al Haymon, the first South African fighter to do so. The 27-year-old is a former IBO World champion in two weight classes – he was stripped of his IBO light-heavyweight title on the scales in June for failing to make weight – and has yet to schedule a date for his next fight.

Oosthuizen is an awkward fighter with decent hand speed, a snappy jab and is defensively sound. Stevenson wouldn’t want to face him at this point in his career. Although he has good reflexes for a 38-year-old in the sport, he’s never been up against a guy that’s constantly making offensive fighters like himself think for 12 rounds.

When Oosthuizen feints, he fools his opponent into thinking he’s going to the body and lands a quick right hand upstairs, then pivots before his man has a chance to counter him in return.
Stevenson would have to knock him out to win the fight, but here’s the thing: Oosthuizen excels against that type of a fighter. Robert Berridge and Ryno Liebenberg for example, two guys with a decent amount of power, were out-boxed and out-classed by Oosthuizen.

Of course, an even better fight than what I’m proposing would be Stevenson v. Kovalev, but as he continues fighting on PBC, the fight may never happen.

On the other hand, Stevenson could get an exclusive sponsorship from Heinz because boy, tomato cans; they’ll get crushed.

He’ll finish a game Karpency inside the fifth round in September.