Shakur Stevenson has a unique ability to neutralize opponents, completely derailing their game plan before they know what hit them. And his opponents have to make changes on the fly, something Teofimo Lopez failed to do in their fight on Saturday night at Madison Square Garden. The result?

An utterly one-sided beatdown, something no one has even managed to do to ‘The Takeover’ before. So, what exactly went wrong? If experts are to be asked, ‘Sugar’ Stevenson is simply a better and sharper boxer. However, according to Lopez’s father and long-time trainer, his son simply didn’t follow the game plan.

Lopez Sr. claims it wasn’t Teofimo Lopez in the ring

Speaking to Brunch Boxing after the fight concluded, Teofimo Lopez Sr. told the reporter that he was “100%” sure his son was going to win the fight. “[But] for some reason… my son didn’t do what I told him he was supposed to do,” Lopez Sr. said. “His rhythm was supposed to be different, where we were supposed to stop Shakur from doing whatever Shakur does best.”

Lopez Sr. congratulated Shakur Stevenson for winning, but added, “That was not my son in there.” He added that media speculation about the winner’s next fight in May got into his son’s head. He also revealed that there was chatter that he came in drunk for the press conference. “I think all that affected him in this fight,” Lopez Sr. added.

“A lot of people say, my son is mentally like easy to mess with,” Lopez Sr. said, adding, “How are you going to fight when everybody wants you to lose?” Teofimo Lopez’s father suggested he didn’t clearly know what went wrong, but claimed that it appeared his son had lost all of his power when the fight began.

“And like everything that we planned, everything that he did in sparring, everything that we planned to do was not there,” Lopez Sr. told the reporter. Regardless of what went wrong, ‘The Takeover’ suffered his second career loss, along with losing his WBO super lightweight title. Stevenson, on the other hand, remains undefeated.

With the win, he became a four-division champion, and he is already pitted against other elites in the division. That said, what does Teofimo Lopez have to say about his loss?

Lopez gets real about loss to Shakur Stevenson

Teofimo Lopez didn’t sugarcoat his performance after his one-sided loss to Shakur Stevenson. He offered a brutally honest assessment of what went wrong on fight night. “I was gambling, and the dealer didn’t give me the right cards,” Lopez admitted afterward. “I didn’t fight too hard tonight. We got the decision that we got.”

The former champion took full responsibility, adding, “I did poorly on not listening to my team. That’s on me.” Lopez struggled to deal with Stevenson’s sharp southpaw jab, which repeatedly split his guard and opened a cut near his left eye. Despite landing body shots, Lopez acknowledged tactical mistakes.

“I was playing too much of his game,” he said. Still, he remains determined. “We’ll go back to the drawing board… We’ll definitely be back in some way, some form.”

While Lopez Sr.’s criticism was harsh, the fighter himself echoed the sentiment, admitting his own failures on fight night. But do you think ‘The Takeover’ could have done anything that would have gotten him the win?