“Shakur beat him, but he didn’t beat his ass,” Mercado said. “You know, there were a lot of times when he just hit him with jabs to his face. That’s cool, bro, but when you got a guy mentally defeated. That’s when you take advantage and let your hands go. We failed to see that yet again from Shakur. There’s a lot of holes in his game, hopefully one day…I get the opportunity with him.”
The line about “mentally defeated” is the one that lingers. Mercado’s argument is not that Stevenson lost to Lopez. It is that once Lopez had conceded the chess match, Stevenson never stepped on the gas. He stayed behind the jab. He took rounds. He kept it tidy. He won clean. He never crossed into something more damaging.
That has followed Stevenson before. He controls distance. He dictates pace. He limits risk. He wins rounds. The criticism, fair or not, is that he rarely chases the kind of finish that shuts the door on debate. Against a former undisputed champion like Lopez, on a heavily marketed pay-per-view card in New York, some fans expected a statement. Instead, they saw efficiency.
Mercado is positioning himself as the antidote. He has spent more than a year calling Stevenson out. So far, he has been ignored. From Mercado’s view, the hesitancy to engage him only reinforces the idea that Stevenson prefers control over danger.
Stevenson has belts and victories over top names. Mercado has knockouts and pressure. Styles like that eventually collide if the division forces it. Right now, Mercado is trying to make sure his voice stays loud enough that it cannot be brushed aside.
The truth is simple. Stevenson wins, but fighters like Mercado are betting that winning safely is not the same as breaking someone down. That distinction may decide whether Shakur stays untouchable or finally gets tested the way critics have been asking for.
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