Christopher Diaz's planned bout against Jessie Magdaleno for St. Patrick's Day weekend is no longer happening.
The fight has been called off as Diaz will now likely face rising star Shakur Stevenson on April 20. The fight is scheduled to take place on the pay-per-view card for Terence Crawford's WBO welterweight title defense against Amir Khan at Madison Square Garden.
The fight between Diaz and Magdaleno was originally supposed to take place on an ESPN+ card also set for the Hulu Theater at Madison Square Garden on March 17. That card would have been headlined by Michael Conlan's next fight against Ruben Garcia. The reason for the potential change is that Diaz was offered a better deal to take the fight against Stevenson versus fighting Magdaleno.
Diaz has only fought once since losing to current WBO super featherweight world champion Masayuki Ito by unanimous decision last July in the main event of an ESPN+ card in Florida. In November, Diaz knocked out David Berna in the first round of their bout in Puerto Rico and took place and saw Diaz go back down to featherweight where he has yet to lose.
Stevenson is an up-and-coming prospect who won a silver medal in the 2016 Summer Olympics. The 21-year-old from Newark, New Jersey has won all 10 of his pro bouts, six of them coming from inside the distance. In his last fight in January, Stevenson knocked out Jessie Cris Rosales to win the vacant IBF Intercontinental and WBC Continental Americas featherweight titles.
