Go Away, Adonis Stevenson: Kovalev vs. Ward Is the Fight Everyone Wants Now

Sometimes, you just need to move on.

That’ll be the epigraph on the tombstone of what seems to be the now-dead showdown between light heavyweight claimants Sergey Kovalev and Adonis Stevenson, with the latest (and perhaps final) round of negotiations dead in the water, per Lance Pugmire of the Los Angeles Times.

Kovalev’s promoter Kathy Duva and his manager Egis Klimas threw the blame at the feet of Al Haymon and Stevenson, who, despite some post-fight bravado after the Russian’s cold-blooded beatdown of Jean Pascal on Saturday night, has never shown any inclination to do much more than talk about fighting the Krusher.

Chris Mannix of Yahoo Sports succinctly summarized the whole affair in one tweet, pointing out whom he feels shoulders the blame:

Stevenson, holder of the “man who beat the man” lineal title by virtue of his one-punch demolition of Chad Dawson in 2013, has become increasingly irrelevant in a division he’s supposed to rule over since jumping over the network divide to squash a Kovalev clash in 2014.

He’s beaten Andrzej Fonfara (in a tough back-and-forth fight), a nobody (Dmitry Sukhotsky), a blown-up super middleweight (Sakio Bika) and a club fighter (Tommy Karpency) in the same stretch that Kovalev unified three-fourths of the division’s belts and shellacked all-time great Bernard Hopkins and twice starched the former lineal champ, Pascal.

Perception matters in this game, and the word on the street (at least for a large segment of boxing media and fandom) is that Stevenson has taken the path of least resistance, while Kovalev has sought out and turned back tough challenges.

“Even though the man who beat the man becomes the man on paper, Adonis Stevenson was in position to represent that, and he didn’t,” Hopkins told Bleacher Report on the subject last year. “They have to stop hiding, the fighters, they call themselves that, hiding behind their business people. And say this is my career. This is my legacy.”

Lyle Fitzsimmons tried his hand at tackling this issue last week; granted the sample size isn’t huge, but 88.3 percent of the 1,116 fans (as of this writing) who responded to the poll blamed Stevenson for using business as an excuse to avoid a Kovalev fight.

So, we move on, the sport moves on, and the fans are once again deprived of a significant fight that should have happened.

Stevenson will continue to float around, defending his belt against an increasingly shallow pool of potential challengers, while Kovalev steams full-speed ahead toward a significant fight with former super middleweight kingpin and potential No. 1 pound-for-pound fighter Andre Ward.

That’s the fight right now.

It’s the one that matters for both Ward and Kovalev; it's a high-level chess match between one of the sport’s smoothest operators and its most dangerous man.

Ward sat ringside at the Bell Center in Montreal on Saturday night to personally take in the carnage that took place in the ring.

Kovalev, taking his pound of flesh, readily admitted to Max Kellerman in the post-fight interview that he intentionally took his foot off the gas in order to prolong the agony for his foe.

It was scary, chilling stuff.

Ward is scheduled to return in March in his hometown of Oakland, California, against undefeated light heavyweight contender Sullivan Barrera of Cuba. Ward has become something of a forgotten figure in the sport after extended periods of inactivity caused by injury and poor career management.

Many a smart boxing person will tell you that Ward is possibly the best equipped man in the sport to neutralize the Krusher’s rapidly developing (and improving) skill set in the ring.

Alexis Cuarezma/Getty Images

People forget just how good Ward was while cleaning out the 168-pound division, beating literally every significant fighter in his neighborhood to capture Showtime’s Super Six tournament with a 2011 win over Carl Froch.

Now, that’s largely his fault for going into self-imposed exile in boxing’s equivalent of the witness protection program over the last couple of years.

But, in the epic words of Roy Jones Jr.: "Y’all must’ve forgot."

Kovalev vs. Ward for the people’s (and IBF, WBA and WBO) light heavyweight championship is the type of elite-level fight that both men need at this stage of their careers.

Ward to restore his star.

Kovalev to remove all doubt.

Stevenson?

He's become Mr. Irrelevant.

Kevin McRae is a member of the Boxing Writers Association of America. You can follow him on Twitter @McRaeWrites.