By Jeff Aranow: The other night former light welterweight champion Terence ‘Bud’ Crawford got into a heat argument with fellow Top Rank fighter Jose Benavidez. In video of the argument, Crawford could be heard challenging the 25-year-old Benavidez (26-0, 17 KOs) to step outside so they could settle it in a fight.
What was interesting was how Crawford was willing to take the argument outside rather than just brushing it off. One would hope that Crawford isn’t doing the same thing to other people, because it could lead to trouble for him sooner or later.
”Focus on your fight before you not make it to your fight,” Crawford was heard saying to Benavidez.
For a fighter that Top Rank is trying to turn into a star, it’s not a good thing that Crawford is ready to duke it out with someone in the same promotional company. The last thing Crawford and Top Rank needs is for him to be fighting left and right while they’re trying hard to turn him into a PPV attraction. Top Rank might want to keep an eye on Crawford to make sure he doesn’t get involved in any fisticuffs outside of the ring. If someone gets hurt, it would be bad news. Crawford is a professional fighter. The last thing he needs is to be dealing with legal issues related to a fist fight.
Crawford, 29, advised Benavidez to focus on his fight that he had coming up against Matthew Strode. Benavidez later knocked Strode out in the 8th round last Saturday night in a Top Rank card headlined by Gilberto ‘Zurdo’ Ramirez vs. Habib Ahmed at the Bank of America Center in Corpus Christi, Texas.
Crawford is going to be fighting for a world title against WBO welterweight champion Jeff Horn on ESPN PPV on April 14 at Madison Square Garden in New York. That fight is only 2 months away. If Crawford were to suffer a cut or some other kind of injury in a street fight with the 25-year-old Jose Benavidez, it surely would be a good deal for him or his promoters at Top Rank. Crawford’s promoter Bob Arum plans on having Top Rank’s only pay-per-view fighter Manny Pacquiao fight on the undercard against possibly 37-year-old Mike Alvarado.
The winner of the Pacquiao-Alvarado and Horn-Crawford fight will then face each other later this year. So in other words, we’re probably looking at Pacquiao vs. Crawford for the WBO welterweight title. The idea behind that fight is Pacquiao putting up a valiant effort but losing to Crawford. The result is Crawford is turned into a PPV star. I think that’s dream stuff. That’s how it’s supposed to work, but I don’t think it will. Crawford will beat Pacquiao, but remain just a regular ESPN guy, although you can expect Arum to test the waters by having the Nebraska native’s fights on PPV anyway. I don’t think it’s going to work at all.
