NEW YORK — Tim Bradley has fired back at Shakur Stevenson after the current pound-for-pound No. 3 questioned his Hall of Fame credentials, defending a career that he says earned induction into three Hall of Fames and a peak ranking at No. 3 on the pound-for-pound list.
Bradley addressed Stevenson directly in his rebuttal, pushing back on personal attacks and the criticism of his resume. “Yeah, you may have more money than me but it’s completely irrelevant to what I said about you,” Bradley said. “That’s what I don’t understand about Shakur Stevenson. I don’t understand why he even went down that lane. I hurt you that bad, big dog? ... He called me a bum — okay, I’m a bum — but he said Ray Robinson is buns... I can’t even take this dude seriously. I can’t.”
Bradley then pointed to his own standing at the top of the sport to counter Stevenson’s dismissal. “You sit there and you saying you don’t know how I became into the Hall of Fame and all this stuff. Let me educate you a little bit, bro. I sat where you sitting right now on the pound-for-pound. You’re at #3,” Bradley said. “But no knock on the guys that’s above you right now, those are helluva fighters, okay, Inoue, Usyk — helluva fighters. They not Manny Pacquiao and they not Floyd Mayweather. No.” He added, “I didn’t just get in one Hall of Fame, I got in three Hall of Fames. That means my peers and the elders, the ones what watch generations after generations — they watched me get down. They got me in the Hall of Fame.”
The former champion also cited international recognition for his style and resume. “I even won awards in Britain. I’m not even from Britain. 2008, go ahead and research it, bro. Fight of the Year, you’ll never see, ever,” Bradley said. “No, I didn’t put people to sleep, but I didn’t put people to sleep.” The exchange extends the ongoing war of words between the two as Bradley continues to defend his legacy against Stevenson’s criticism.