Boxing

Claressa Shields willing to fight Jessica McCaskill, but with a caveat

DAZN

24, Oct 22

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Claressa Shields notched the biggest win of her career on Oct. 15 when she traveled to Savannah Marshall's home country of England and won by unanimous decision to become a two-time women's middleweight champion.

In the aftermath, the question has been what's next for the native of Michigan? Will she stay at 160 pounds and defend her titles? Go back down to 154? Or move up in weight for a possible rematch against undisputed super-middleweight champion Franchon Crews-Dezurn.

Shields and Crews-Dezurn fought in November 2016 in the latter's pro debut. Shields won the four-round affair. The two-time Olympic gold medalist appeared on the latest edition of The DAZN Boxing Show and made it clear she isn't keen on making that fight happen unless a Brinks truck is backed up to her driveway. She did list a couple of options, including a callout of another four-belt champion.

"Well, I'm not fighting against Franchon (Crews-Dezurn) unless they pay us a whole lot of money," Shields said. "I'm talking about two, three, four, five million (dollars), so I'm not fighting (her) because Franchon and I are close. I think that if that’s the fight you want, that's the Laila Ali versus Ann Wolfe fight that you never got. You got to pay for that. Even though we fought four rounds, it'd be a completely different fight. I think if we were to fight ten rounds, it'd be an all-out war even though we have a love for each other, but we're both big competitors.

"So if they want that fight at 168, (it) depends on who's gonna pay for it and, and when. But I can go back down to (1)54 and fight against Natasha Jonas and Terry Harper. I can go to (1)75. Like I've been saying, if Jessica, 'Mcnoskill' (McCaskill) wants to get her ass whooped at 147, I can go to 47 too."

In the past, Shields has said she'd be willing to drop to welterweight, but it'd have to be for the right fight. For the fight to become a reality, McCaskill first needs to get past junior welterweight titlist Chantelle Cameron on Nov. 5, which you can see on DAZN with WBA (super) light heavyweight champion Dmitry Bivol vs. Gilberto Ramirez serving as the headliner. If Shields is going to accept the fight though, it comes with a catch.

"I'm not doing it at 145 (147), and then I got a rehydration clause and all that crap," Shields said. "If I make the weight, I don't care if I rehydrate up to 180. That’s none of your business. If you're gonna take the fight or not, my job is to make the 147-pound weight limit which I know I can, and that's it."