Stevenson's next fight will be the last under his contract with Top Rank

Top Rank's head promoter Bob Arum has revealed that one of his top stars, WBC lightweight champion Shakur Stevenson, will soon become a free agent.

"Shakur will fight on July 6 at the Prudential Center Arena in New Jersey. We will announce his opponent relatively soon. We had a great series with Shakur. He's an incredible fighter with incredible skills, but our contract ends after the July 6 fight. Hopefully we'll keep in touch with Shakur and continue to work together, but he'll be a free agent after the July 6 fight. So we'll see how things work out. The guys in the office told me that they picked a very good opponent for Shakur.

We hope to continue to promote his fights, but he's a free agent. That doesn't mean he's our enemy or anything like that. The sport is a business. I truly believe that Shakur has developed into one of the great fighters of our era. I truly believe that if you put him against William Cepeda, who is a good fighter but not a great fighter, that fight will be uncompetitive," Arum said.