Claressa Shields earns a stellar win against Danielle Perkins.
Claressa Shields outpointed Danielle Perkins to become the first female undisputed heavyweight champion in history. Shields dropped Perkins during the contest and earned a unanimous decision.
The judges scored the bout 97-92, 99-90, and 100-89. While Perkins was the heavier fighter, Shields showed his power, dropping her opponent with a thunderous right hand.
She also became the first ever boxer, male or female, to become the undisputed champion across three different weight classes. Shields has done so in light middleweight, middleweight, and heavyweight.
In front of her home crowd in Flint, Michigan, Shields improved his perfect professional record to 16-0-0. Speaking after the fight, GWOAT said:
I actually think I’m going to have to have surgery on my left arm. I tore my labrum last week, so the fight almost didn’t happen. I didn’t want to let Flint down, but I really couldn’t use my jab the way that I wanted to. I iced it, I did therapy and now I think I’m going to have a shoulder surgery.
Shields, who won the Olympic gold medals in 2012 and 2016, kept adding to her ever growing legacy with the win against Perkins. She highlighted how she was able to manage the threat of the bigger opponent, saying:
Danielle was strong, she was definitely a problem but my experience and my skills got me over it. I’ve been in plenty of street fights with bigger people and I had to use some of my skills in that today, too. So, when I dropped her in the last round, it’s because she got greedy.
– Claressa Shields
