Claressa Shields looked into her phone’s camera lens to make eye contact, then held up an index finger.
As the undisputed women’s middleweight champion, she had just been asked in an interview over video conference how long it would take for her to reach pay parity with similarly credentialed male boxers.
“In one year,” she said.
Reaching that milestone will require defeating Ema Kozin, an undefeated challenger from Slovenia, in the cofeature of a pay-per-view card in Cardiff, Wales, on Saturday night. Shields’s bout is the first in a two-fight deal with the British broadcaster Sky Sports that includes just over $1 million in guaranteed pay and should culminate in a showdown with Savannah Marshall, the English boxer who was the only person to have beaten Shields as an amateur.
“I’ll be making what those guys make,” said Shields, a 26-year-old from Flint, Mich. “It’s going to come very, very soon. Quicker than we think. It’s great timing.”
To be clear, “those guys,” does not refer to Saúl Álvarez, the super middleweight champion nicknamed Canelo who is widely considered to be the top male boxer in the world. He’s undoubtedly the best-paid boxer on the planet, earning a reported $40 million guarantee for a win in November over Caleb Plant.
But for Shields’s team, approaching or matching the paydays of male fighters who are accomplished but not necessarily well known to mainstream sports fans is a realistic goal. Last year, Jermell Charlo, the men’s super welterweight champion, earned a reported $3 million for his title defense against Brian Castaño, with $1 million of that money guaranteed. Wins over Kozin, 23, and Marshall, 30, could potentially vault Shields into that pay bracket.
“Claressa’s the perfect athlete at the right time to progress women’s boxing to the next level,” said Dmitriy Salita, Shields’s promoter. “Claressa’s going to get rewarded proportionately to the success of her events.”
For Shields and her management team, that timing refers to her growth from the teenager who won gold at the 2012 Olympics, to a champion who won again at the 2016 Games, to an undefeated professional with world titles in two weight classes.
Viewed through the prism of wins, losses and championships, Shields’s career has been marked by the steady, linear progress that, Salita said, should bring a fighter bigger paydays, regardless of gender.
But Shields, who is 11-0 with two knockouts as a professional, has not had the uninterrupted broadcast partnerships that often build standout boxers into stars. Most of Shields’s bouts have appeared on Showtime — she turned pro on the network in November 2016, and two of her three most recent bouts have also been broadcast there. But she has also competed on HBO and the sports streaming service DAZN.
Shields’s most recent bout, a unanimous-decision win over Marie-Eve Dicaire of Canada in March 2021, headlined an independent pay-per-view card staged by Salita’s promotional company.
Since then, Shields has competed in mixed martial arts, going 1-1 in two fights with the Professional Fighters League, and helped with the production of a feature film about her life. Shields said the detour into M.M.A. improved her boxing by boosting her overall strength, and that her side projects will grow her profile.
“All of that is bringing fans back to my boxing,” she said.
Shields’s two-fight deal with Sky Sports is unfolding as female boxers earn an increasing share of the sport’s attention and money.
Last week, Amanda Serrano and Katie Taylor announced they would meet on April 30 in the main event at Madison Square Garden, marking the first time two women will headline a fight card at the Garden’s main arena. The event’s promoter, Matchroom Boxing chairman Eddie Hearn, said each fighter is guaranteed at least $1 million — and he has a simple explanation for the shift in the pay scale for elite female boxers.
“It’s demand,” Hearn said. “That’s the only reason increased money comes into a fight or a sport. Sponsors want to be involved in women’s sport. They want to be involved in events that are going to attract a lot of eyeballs.”
Hearn said the Serrano and Taylor fight will be the biggest women’s boxing match in history; Salita said the honor will belong to Shields and Marshall, whenever they meet. In 2012, Marshall and Shields fought as amateurs, with Marshall winning 14-8 under the computerized scoring system amateur bouts used. Shields has not lost a boxing match since.
Public demand for a rematch depends partly on Marshall winning her next fight, which is scheduled for March 12 against Femke Hermans of Belgium.
“Claressa is in my sights. It’s in touching distance,” Marshall told reporters earlier this week.
The bout hinges on Shields dispatching Kozin, who has recorded 11 knockouts in 21 professional wins. Like Marshall, Kozin is a southpaw who is convinced she can dethrone Shields.
“I don’t feel any pressure because of who she is,” Kozin told reporters in January. “I see it as a huge opportunity, and not some kind of burden.”
Shields, for her part, said the prospect of a high-profile, big-money showdown with Marshall will not distract her from the Kozin fight.
“I’m focusing on who’s in front of me,” Shields said. “Marshall and her team are focusing on me.”
