By Allan Fox: Top Rank promoter Bob Arum says that he would like to see his fighter Manny Pacquiao possibly fighting light welterweight champion Terence Crawford if he gets past WBO welterweight champion Jessie Vargas in their fight on November 5th. If Pacquiao wins that fight, then he says he would like to see him fight Crawford.
A fighter that Arum doesn’t think is ready to fight Pacquiao is unbeaten #1 IBF welterweight contender Errol Spence Jr. (21-0, 18 KOs), who he sees as an unproven prospect at this point. It’s unclear why Arum considers Spence a prospect when he’s ranked at the top of the IBF’s rankings, but that’s how Arum sees him.
Stephen A. Smith of ESPN’s First Take said this to Bob Arum about a potential fight between Pacquiao and unbeaten Errol Spence:
“How about [a fight between] Errol Spence Jr. [and Manny Pacquiao]? I would like to see Pacquiao in a fight like that. How about that, Bob?”
Arum then replied with this response:
“Wait, wait, wait. Errol Spence looks like he’s going to be a terrific fighter, but he hasn’t really proven himself. He hasn’t fought for a world title yet. He hasn’t fought some of the best fighters in the welterweight division. Can he possibly rise to the top? Can he beat a [Danny] Garcia? Can he beat a [Keith] Thurman? We don’t know. Possibly, yes. But the truth is he’s a terrific prospect, but he’s still a prospect. Maybe he has the goods to rise to the top.”
Spence isn’t well known yet to the casual boxing fans, but then again neither is Crawford or Lomachenko. Those guys are champions, but DEFINITELY not well known to the casual boxing fans. The main difference is that Lomachenko and Crawford are with Arum’s Top Rank stable; whereas Spence is one of Al Haymon’s fighters. It doesn’t even matter that Crawford and Lomachenko are world champions, because the only ones who are aware of that are the hardcore fans. The casual fans don’t know who Crawford and Lomachenko are, at least a good percentage of them don’t.
I think it would be bad for Pacquiao to fight Spence, because he’d lose, as would Crawford and of course Lomachenko in my view. If Arum throws Pacquiao inside the ring with Spence, he’d likely be knocked out like Leonard Bundu recently was, but even quicker.
If Arum really believes that Spence is a prospect rather than a contender, then he should throw Top Rank fighters Jessie Vargas, Viktor Postol or Crawford in the ring with him and see how much of a prospect he is. I think it would be interesting to see how long those fighters last against Spence. I don’t think Arum would even consider for a second to let any of those guys fight Spence, but if he actually believes he’s a prospect, then he needs to test him with those guys. If he doesn’t want to feed Pacquiao to Spence, then let Postol, Vargas, Crawford or Lomachenko fight him, and then he can talk about it afterwards. Somehow, I don’t see Arum doing that. I guess his justification for not putting those guys in with Spence might be similar reasoning for why he won’t put Pacquiao in with him.
Spence is in a position where he’s probably not going to be recognized by the other promoters until he picks up a world title or two. By that time guys like Pacquiao will likely be on his last legs, and about done with the sport. Crawford, 29, is still young enough to eventually face Spence in the future. I don’t know if Arum would let that fight happen. I guess it would depend on how popular Spence becomes. If he becomes a superstar in the welterweight division, then I can see Arum or someone from the Top Rank organization making the fight between Spence and Crawford.
As for Vargas, I don’t see Arum ever putting him in with a guy like Spence. If/when Vargas loses to Pacquiao, I see Arum rebuilding him and then having him go back after the WBO 147lb title, which seems to be switching hands between one Top Rank fighter after another. I can see Vargas ending up either fighting Pacquiao in a rematch or battling for the vacant WBO title against one of Arum’s other Top Rank fighters like Tim Bradley or Crawford if he ever moves up in weight.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7MMPJhRT1Bw