Should Lopez defeat Stevenson this weekend, he joins a list of 21st century junior welterweight champions who all rose to, or perhaps just below the Hall of Fame level. And if Shakur emerges victorious, he will become a four-division world champion.

The abundance of world titles across 17 divisions means title-getting is easier than ever these days, even if consistency is still as difficult as it ever was. But apart from what the win could mean for either Lopez or Stevenson, they’re adding to the strange history of one of boxing’s most peculiar divisions.

For many in boxing, the sport’s "junior" divisions were initially poorly received. They ranged from minor inconveniences that should be ignored, to bastard weight classes that stole fighters away from the "original" divisions.

New York City was boxing’s true hub for decades, and it hosted The Ring’s offices and Hall of Fame. The New York State Athletic Commission was formed in the 1910s, disbanded years later and then reformed. It quickly became one of the sport’s most influential organizations.When boxing’s popularity exploded in the 1920s during Jack Dempsey’s iconic heavyweight title run, publishers took note. The Ring was but one of several publications created in the U.S., and the only one that endured. Another was The Boxing Blade out of Minneapolis.Other states came together and formed the National Boxing Association to offset the growing influence of the NYSAC. Presumably to quickly gain traction, the NBA encouraged recognition of new divisions and even tried out a novel method of crowning a world champion: a magazine poll.The NBA officially backed the results of The Boxing Blade’s poll, which was answered by more than 700,000 fans from all over the world, according to the magazine. Pinky Mitchell won by a considerable margin after tabulating votes “from admirers as far away as China, Japan, India, South America, Australia and from every country in Europe.”The Boxing Blade gave an official explanation for why the title and the division were necessary:“The object of the junior welterweight division is to give boxers whose best fighting weight is 140 pounds a class of their own and a chance to win a championship in that class. Before the founding of this class, 140-pound boxers were forced to fight out of their weight if they wanted to try for a title. They had to either box lightweights or regular welterweight. If they fought in the lightweight class they were compelled to take off five pounds to make the weight limit and go in the ring in a weakened condition and not be able to do their best. If they boxed welterweighs they were forced to fight a man outweighing them by seven pounds which was a big handicap. Now, with the formation of the new junior welterweight class at 140 pounds they will be able to fight at their natural poundage, with the added incentive of a title to strive for.”

The words are admittedly written quite convincingly, even if they only amounted to "because we can."

Anyone discrediting a junior welterweight title or Mitchell on the grounds that a magazine led the charge conveniently forgot the National Police Gazette’s role in crowning or attempting to crown its own champions. The Gazette’s publisher Richard K. Fox helped transform prizefighters from lowly brawlers to sports stars as he got more involved in the 1880s.

Regardless of how the division came to be, they’d opened the junior welterweight Pandora’s box. From Mitchell to Barney Ross almost 15 years later, the 140-pound lineage remained unbroken. The Ring even briefly recognized the division in the late 1920s.

In an effort to trim some of the fat, the division was forgotten about by the sport for more than 20 years until Carlos Ortiz and Duilio Loi revived it in the late 1950s and early '60s, and once more The Ring acknowledged the 140-pound crown.

A surprising number of boxing’s pound-for-pound greatest fighters not only made a stop at 140 pounds, but actually ruled the division at one point or another. The accomplishments of Tony Canzoneri and Barney Ross were downgraded for decades as junior welterweight struggled for recognition, and they are now correctly called all-time greats. Ortiz, Loi, Nicolino Locche, Antonio Cervantes, Wilfred Benítez, Aaron Pryor, Julio César Chávez and Oscar de la Hoya were all lineal champions at junior welterweight.

The 21st century champions López is already among and Stevenson hopes to join include Kostya Tszyu, Ricky Hatton, Manny Pacquiao, Terence Crawford and Mikey Garcia. It’s an impressive host of names, and as it turns out the division is stronger than it appears at first glance.

As with all fighters in the last generation or two, López and Stevenson are limited by fighting a much lighter schedule than yesterday’s greats. Both have been fighting as pros for about a decade and average just over two fights per year. To be fair, they’ve kept up their end of the bargain by facing highly ranked and recognizable opponents for about half their careers. What’s one more?

Boxing’s first big-name matchup of 2026 has a chance not only to confirm the pound-for-pound aspirations of a bright star, but put a dent into the history of a division that was once swept aside. Forget all the belts and scattered alphabet mess. The winner of López-Stevenson is another 21st century junior welterweight champion and distant relative of all those 20th century weirdos.