By Tim Royner: Kell Brook says he doubts that he’ll ever fight Amir Khan now that he’s gone off in another direction to face WBO welterweight champion Terence Crawford for his title on April 20 on ESPN PPV. Brook (38-2, 26 KOs) expects Khan to lose to the unbeaten Crawford by a knockout in that fight.
Khan taking the fight against Crawford instead of facing Brook straightaway, looks to some boxing fans like a self-serving move on Amir’s part. He gets a $3 million to $5 million payday in fighting Crawford, and he can then come back and fight Brook for decent money. Khan will get two paydays instead of just one. Khan says he’s fighting Crawford for the shot at glory of beating an undefeated world champion and pound-for-pound fighter, but a lot of people think he’s taking it for the money to slip in another payday before he faces Brook in a cash out fight later this year.
Brook, 32, says he’s not being a hater by picking Crawford (34-0, 25 KOs) to win that fight. He just feels that Crawford is the younger fighter with less mileage on him than Khan right now.
Brook isn’t the only one that feels Khan has (33-4, 20 KOs) has made the wrong decision in fighting Crawford. Matchroom promoter Eddie Hearn also thinks it’s a bad idea for Khan to fight Crawford right now instead of taking the fight that the boxing public wants to see, and that’s Khan-Brook right now. There’s more money on the table for Khan in facing Brook than there is in fighting Crawford.
Khan says the reason he’s taking the fight with Crawford is because he’s an unbeaten world champion, and a highly rated pound-for-pound star on the global scale. In contrast, Brook is no longer a world champion after having been stopped in the 10th round by Errol Spence Jr. in 2017, and he’s coming off of an unimpressive 12 round unanimous decision win over Michael Zerafa on December 8.
“I don’t think it will happen now and I don’t think the fans can blame me,” Brook said to skysports.com about a fight against Khan. “The time for him to fight me was now and if he thought I was that bad, such a punk, he could’ve walked through me and then have those sorts of fights he’s just taken, after it.”
Brook has no choice but to sit and wait for his chance to fight Khan, even if means facing him with him coming off of a bad knockout loss to Crawford. If Brook was willing to take on the best fighters at 147 or 154, like Keith Thurman, Shawn Porter, Crawford, Jarrett Hurd, Jaime Munguia or Tony Harrison, then it wouldn’t matter what Khan does with his career.
Brook would have options available to him. But that doesn’t seem like it’s the case. Jessie Vargas broke the news this week that negotiations between his management and Brook are taking place for a fight on April 6.
Vargas is not one of the major players at 147. Brook looking to fight Vargas suggests that he’s going to be left in a holding pattern until Khan gets done with his fight against Crawford on April 20. In other words, Brook’s promoter Eddie Hearn of Matchroom Boxing hasn’t given up on the idea of making the Khan-Brook fight.