Teofimo Lopez States That Ryan Garcia’s Management Turned Down The Fight

Teofimo Lopez says his team reached out to Ryan Garcia’s promoter, Oscar De La Hoya, for a fight, but the Golden Boy management turned down the clash.

Lopez (22-1, 13 KOs) states that he’ll target Shakur Stevenson for a fight with the intent of whooping him, and leaving him in tears. Hopefully, it’s not Shakur crying tearlessly like he did in the 2016 Olympic finals after he lost to Cuba’s Robeisy Ramirez. That was weird-looking. He was crying with no tears.

Golden Boy Rejects Lopez Offer

De La Hoya has recently told DAZN that he wanted Teofimo for Ryan Garcia, not a rematch with Rolando ‘Rolly’ Romero. For Oscar to change his mind about wanting Lopez for Kingry, it suggests that he’s got something else cooking that would pay better, or one that would give him a good chance of winning. He’d likely be a huge underdog going against Teofimo.

There’s no one at 140 for Ryan to fight who’s popular other than Lopez. At 147, it’s just 46-year-old Manny Pacquiao and Rolly.  Fighting Pacquiao would make Ryan look silly, especially if he loses or looks bad in winning.

My team told @OscarDeLaHoya we’d fight @RyanGarcia next, and his management turned it down.

— Teofimo Lopez (@TeofimoLopez) August 9, 2025

If Shakur (24-0, 11 KOs) is the best Teofimo can do, it’s understandable why he would go in that direction. But he needs to be forewarned. Stevenson is not going to fight him the way he did William Zepeda. He’s going to be on his bike, fighting like he did against Edwin De Los Santos in 2023, and will make it all but impossible for him to land anything other than a jab.

With the way the judges scored the Shakur-Zepeda fight, Lopez needs to think carefully about whether it’s worth fighting him. The judges did Zepeda dirty, giving him no credit for outlanding Shakur in virtually every round of the fight.

They scored the fight as if it were a blowout victory for Stevenson, even giving him the early rounds when Zepeda was working him over against the ropes. What the fight showed is that Shakur is now being given the elite-level treatment that we see fighters like Canelo Alvarez receiving, in which the judges score rounds in his favor that should be going to the opponent.

Unless Teofimo knocks out Stevenson, he likely won’t be given the decision by the judges. I don’t see it happening. Despite being extremely boring to watch with his retro early 2000s Mayweather-esque fighting style, Shakur is now an A-list fighter, and it is going to be impossible to beat him by a decision.