FAMILY FEUD
transcended their sport. Her historical dominance, particularly at a young age, combined with a backstory equal parts harrowing and inspirational – so much so that it ultimately became a feature film – made her irresistible to media outlets. Shields and her fellow participants in the inaugural run of women’s Olympic boxing were, for many, the first women they had ever seen box on television. With very few exceptions, women hadn’t fought on mainstream American television since the era led by Christy Martin and Laila Ali ended about two decades earlier. While women’s boxing was both popular and commonplace in places like Mexico and Germany, where fighters such as Jackie Nava, Ana Maria Torres, Mariana Juarez and Regina Halmich were fighting in front of big TV audiences, and Norway’s Cecilia Braekhus was being seen throughout Europe on a regular basis, most major promoters based in the United States weren’t interested. But on August 21, 2016, the foundation began to crack in a way that would lead to a seismic shift. Shields defeated the Netherlands’ Nouchka Fontijn to capture her second consecutive gold medal, the first American boxer to do so. That same night, on the very same NBC channel, Heather Hardy and Shelly Vincent took part in the first women’s fight to be televised by Premier Boxing Champions, one that would wind up on, or atop, most Female Fight of the Year ballots. In previous eras, a second gold medal for a woman in a major tournament would either mark the end of a fighter’s career, the perfect bow on a tremendous run or simply the beginning of yet another World Amateur Championship training cycle. For elite amateurs in certain countries, the stipend and sponsorship dollars were greater than what was on offer in the professional ranks. But things were a little different
things to come for her and so many others. At that point, staying in the amateurs or stepping into the cage where women like Ronda Rousey were getting exposure unfathomable in women’s boxing seemed like the most logical moves for her. Even without an Olympic medal, if Mayer had been a male fighter in 2017, she would have been scooped up immediately. An exceptional amateur with a medal at the World Championships, Mayer also had the gift of gab and a modeling background, as well as a past life as a bassist in a heavy metal band alongside guitar legend Nita Strauss. The various narrative hooks would have been like catnip to promoters across the country. “I remember watching replays of that fight, and [the commentators] said I’d be turning pro too, and I was taken aback because I hadn’t told anyone about my plans to leave USA Boxing,” Mayer told me in an article for BoxingScene in 2018. “But I was thinking about it. I wanted a bigger stage. I wasn’t prepared to go another four years with little limelight, so I was negotiating a contract with Bellator. I was very close to turning to MMA, because after the Olympics, I didn’t have boxing promoters pushing contracts in my face to turn pro for big money. It was not like the men. And I didn’t have a gold medal like Claressa.” Mayer even began training a little bit for an MMA debut, but unbeknownst to her, times had indeed changed. Not only were female fighters receiving media attention, but Shields’ debut on Showtime drew nearly 250,000 viewers, more than ShoBox would traditionally draw, and substantially more than any other fighter in their second pro fight was likely to attract anywhere. In June 2017, Shields officially signed with Salita Promotions, aligning herself with a rare promoter who had a positive relationship with Showtime and HBO simultaneously.
Left to right: Mayer, Ginny Fuchs, Shields and Charles Conwell in 2016.
now. Shields and her fellow Olympians were better known than any women’s amateurs before them. If the industry felt a rumble in August, it would feel the ground truly shift in November as Shields and Crews- Dezurn fought on the Andre Ward- Sergey Kovalev undercard in a fight former junior welterweight titleholder Chris Algieri has since described as “the highest-level pro debut fight of all time.” Though Shields won every round, the action was blistering and the technique
was solid, enough to disabuse any fair- minded person of their preconceived notions about women’s boxing. Finally, women – or at least a woman – were on the same developmental track as men, the one where promoters scour the Olympics for the standouts, then use their newfound fame to springboard their entry to the professional ranks. But history had shown that in the American boxing marketplace, there was rarely room for more than one woman. They were outliers, “special
that Shields was “the one.” Even her friend and 2016 Olympics teammate Mikaela Mayer thought that. In 2017, Shields made her second- straight appearance on premium cable, this time crossing the aisle to face Szilvia Szabados on Showtime. Mayer traveled to Detroit with future Olympian Ginny Fuchs and sat in the front row to support Shields. Mayer watched Shields dominate Szabados in front of a raucous home crowd, not necessarily thinking that she was watching a preview of
attractions” based on novelty or an inherited cult of personality: Martin, the “Coal Miner’s Daughter”; Ali, the daughter of a legend; and the occasional regional superstars like Holly Holm and Mary Jo Sanders. There was every reason to believe that there was still just space for one, and
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