By Chris Williams: Errol Spence Jr. will be fighting his IBF mandatory challenger Carlos Ocampo tonight, and he says after that he wants to add two more titles to his collection before he looks to face WBO welterweight champion Terence ‘Bud’ Crawford in the final unification fight. What Spence (23-0, 20 KOs) might not be aware of is how difficult it’ll be for him to win the WBA and WBC titles, as getting fights against Keith ‘One Time’ Thurman, Danny Garcia and Shawn Porter could take many years.
Thurman hasn’t fought in a year and a half, and future remains in doubt due to his injury problems. Danny Garcia has spent much of his career facing weak opposition. When he does face good fighters, it tends to be on rare occasions. The worst thing that could happen to Crawford is Garcia beats Porter in their fight for the vacant WBC welterweight title. Garcia winning the WBC 147 lb. title could put Spence at the end of a long line. Spence might have to wait two or more years before he gets Garcia to agree to fight him. By that point, Spence will likely have outgrown the 147 lb. weight class.
”It’s definitely going to happen, I don’t know when, I mean realistically it’s not going to happen now, but this fight is going to build up,” Spence said to Fighthub about a unification fight between him and Crawford. ”I still got two belts on my side of the street that I’m looking to get and that’s way easier to make than a Terence Crawford fight. So I’m staying on my side of the street, I’m going to get those belts, when I have three of the belts and unify, then we’ll go look at Terence Crawford,” Spence said.
Spence, 28, will be the favorite when he does face Crawford in the future because of his size, power and pedigree. Crawford hasn’t been matched against good opposition during his career. His recent fight against WBO paper champion Jeff Horn is a perfect example of that. Instead of Crawford being matched against the best welterweight champion, he was put in against the weakest
The World Boxing Association would be doing Spence and the rest of the 147lb division a huge favor if they were to strip the inactive Keith Thurman. The guy hasn’t fought in 15 months since defeating Danny Garcia last year in March 2017, and he still doesn’t have a timeline for when he will be returning to the ring to fight again. If the WBA strips Thurman, it means Jessie Vargas and Jamal James will fight for the WBA belt. Those two don’t have a history of chronic injury problems, and they wouldn’t likely be afraid to fight Spence in a unification fight. The WBA’s decision to let Thurman sit on their welterweight title without defending is slowing down Spence’s quest to unify the welterweight division. Unless the WBA strips Thurman, Spence could be waiting a long time before he gets a shot at Thurman’s WBA title.
“I mean I just seen the usual, the usual Terence Crawford. I mean he looked skilled, he did his thing. I just never been impressed with Jeff Horn period, ever, so that’s just what that was with me,” Spence said.