William Zepeda’s pursuit of Shakur Stevenson didn’t materialize, and now the unbeaten lightweight has turned his attention to Giovanni Cabrera.
Zepeda, 30-0 (26 KOs), will meet Cabrera, 22-1 (7 KOs), on July 6 at Toyota Arena in Ontario, California, as the main event of a DAZN-streamed card promoted by Golden Boy Promotions.
This fight will provide an opportunity to compare how Zepeda, 27, does against Cabrera with the result from when Cabrera faced another top lightweight, Isaac “Pitbull” Cruz.
Cabrera, 29, went the distance with Cruz in July 2023, with “Pitbull” claiming an uninspiring split-decision against the crafty Chicago product. Cruz proceeded to dominate Rolando Romero on March 30, claiming the WBA lightweight strap.
Zepeda appeared to cast his attention on unbeaten WBC titleholder Shakur Stevenson following Zepeda’s March 16 fourth-round domination over Maxi Hughes.
Stevenson, a three-division titleholder, will instead fight Artem Harutyunyan, also on July 6, on an ESPN card broadcasting from Newark, New Jersey.
It will take impressively defeating Cabrera for Zepeda to improve his stock in a division loaded with elite names, including Gervonta “Tank” Davis and Vasiliy Lomachenko, plus Emanuel Navarrete, who is looking to become a four-division titleholder this Saturday night on ESPN when he meets Denys Berinchyk for the vacant WBO belt.
Golden Boy also has welterweight Alexis Rocha, 24-2 (16 KOs), on the July 6 card versus Mexico’s Raul Curiel, 15-0 (13 KOs), along with a junior bantamweight bout pitting Ricardo Rafael Sandoval, 24-2 (17 KOs), versus Angel Ramos Serrano, 32-1-2 (19 KOs).