By Chris Williams: Terence Crawford has finally admitted that he simply is NOT interested in fighting former IBF/WBC welterweight champion Shawn Porter in his next fight. Crawford says he doesn’t want the fight, even though it would be by far the biggest one of his career.
Porter (30-3-1, 17 KOs) and his father/trainer Kenny Porter have been talking to the media for the past two weeks making it known that they want Crawford’s promoter Bob Arum of Top Rank to contact them so that they can make the fight, but nothing has happened.
If Crawford is turning the Porter fight down right now, he might be thinking he swing back later, and negotiate it. Whether Porter is willing to still fight Crawford later on down the line will depend on if the money is worth it.
Porter = a bad style match-up for Crawford
You have to believe that if Crawford doesn’t want to fight Porter right now, he doesn’t like his chances of winning. Porter is an excellent inside fighter, and is capable of pressuring runners like Crawford, and making them miserable. All the junk stuff that Crawford likes to use with changing stances, counter punching and running, they don’t work against Porter. He intercepts runners, and he smothers counter punchers.
Crawford could change stances all he wants while he’s being mugged by Porter on the inside, and it won’t help him. Counter punching only works when fighters are on the outside or at medium range. Porter would all all over Crawford like glue, so he would never have the opportunity to counter punch. As such, Crawford would be in a brutal beating, and there would be nothing to save him.
Now it’s clear why Arum hasn’t phoned Kenny to start the negotiations. Crawford doesn’t want the fight for whatever reason, and the only thing that you can think is he’s not confident he can win it. The perception that a lot of boxing fans have is Crawford has been cherry-picking soft opposition his entire career, and that’s the reason why he’s still unbeaten at 36-0.
Crawford rules out Porter fight
“That’s not a fight that I’m focused on right now or even worried about,” said Crawford to DAZN about a fight between him and Porter. “I’m focused on other things right now. If we had to fight and if it made sense, then that would be a fight that we would both agree upon. But right now, I feel like that’s not something we should discuss right now, because there’s nothing on the table for me,” said Crawford.
This is obviously disappointing news that Crawford isn’t willing to fight Porter, since that would have been a way for him to earn the fight with Spence. Right now, Crawford’s resume is woefully poor from top to bottom. It’s a weak resume that one sees with a lot of fighters.
Top Rank has done a good job of matching Crawford carefully by matching him against strictly guys that he can beat, and not against the talented fighters. Crawford bailed from the 140 lb division without fighting Josh Taylor, Regis Prograis or Jose Ramirez. At 135, he only fought Yuriorkis Gamboa. He didn’t tangle with any of the other talented lightweights. At 147, Crawford’s opposition has been mediocre guys with him beating these fighters:
- Jeff Horn
- Jose Benavidez Jr.
- Amir Khan
- Egidijus Kavaliauskas
Crawford with few options for big fights
The only fighter that Top Rank promoter Bob Arum was interested in matching Crawford against at 147 was Porter, and other than that, he spoke of putting him in with 140-pounders. Arum wants to have Regis Prograis, Josh Taylor or Jose Ramirez move up to 147 to challenge Crawford. I think it’s unlikely that Arum will be able to get Prograis or Taylor to agree to fight Crawford. They’re not going to want to fight him in their first fight at 147.
If Crawford doesn’t want to fight Porter, then there’s no point in him talking about a unification match against IBF/WBC welterweight champion Errol Spence Jr., because that’s not going to happen.
Let’s assume that’s the fight that Crawford really wants right now is against Spence due to him not being 100% after his car crash last October. That fight still isn’t going to happen right away when Errol comes back in the first half of 2020, because there’s no way his adviser Al Haymon is going to put him in with a good fighter right away.
Porter would have been Crawford’s only big fight in his career
The 32-year-old Crawford still isn’t a pay-per-view star after 10 years as a professional, and he’s never had a big fight during his career. He supposedly wants to fight the welterweights signed with Premier Boxing Champions, but now that one of them wants to challenge him, he’s not interested.it’s sad, because right now the closest thing that Crawford has come to a big fight was against the shot Amir Khan last April.
That was a nonsense fight between Crawford and a fighter that hasn’t done anything with his career since 2011. Khan is like Julio Cesar Chavez Jr. type of fighter, whose career imploded around 2011/2012. Khan has done zero with his career since his win over a past his best Zab Judah in 2011. Despite that, Top Rank surprisingly made Crawford vs. Khan on ESPN PPV. It wasn’t even close to being a pay-per-view worthy fight, and yet that’s where it ended up. The fight was horrible from start to finish, and ended with Crawford hitting Khan with a low blow. I guess you can that ending was fitting for such a terrible mismatch.
Porter is with PBC, and he’s the only one that’s interested in fighting him. With Crawford saying he’s not interested in the Porter fight, he’s probably closed the door on him ever getting a fight against a PBC fighter. That might be a good thing for Crawford though, because if he did fight Porter or any other PBC fighter, he’d likely lose. Once that happens, Arum wouldn’t be able to bang on about how Crawford is the best welterweight in the division.
Crawford not enthusiastic about moving to 154
“I haven’t heard anything about that, so I can’t really give my take on that,” said Crawford on a fight against WBO junior middleweight champion Patrick Teixeira. “I’ve seen him fight [Carlos] Adames.
“We watched that fight at my house in training camp. He looks alright boxing, and he did everything he had to do. With my skills, I feel like I could go up in weight if I wanted to, but I’m at 147 right now, and that’s the weight I’m campaigning at. So that’s the weight I’m focused at,” said Crawford.
It’s interesting that Crawford isn’t willing to move up to 154 to take on WBO champion Patrick Teixeira, because that would be a winnable fight for him. It wouldn’t be easy obviously because Teixeira is big, powerful and he can take a good punch.
Crawford may win, but Teixeira would have his pound of flesh. It’s a fight that Crawford would take punishment, and he might even hit the deck once or twice. We saw Crawford get dropped by Egidijus Kavaliauskas on December 14, and he’s nowhere near the same kind of puncher as Teixeira.
There would be nothing for Crawford to gain if he moved up to 154 and fought Teixeira, since that guy doesn’t have a big fan base. If Crawford is going to move up to 154, which he clearly isn’t, he would need to fight WBC champ Jermell Charlo or IBF/WBA champion Julian ‘J-Rock’ Williams.
Terence gives hmself a B minus for Kavaliauskas fight
“I expected my opponent to be tough. I’ve been following him for a long time live and in person,” said Crawford to DAZN on Egidijus Kavaliauskas. “What do you expect from a two-time Olympian. I give myself a B minus, and I did a lot of things in there wrong. And I fought the wrong fight, but at the same time I got the job done in tremendous fashion, and that’s all that matters at the end of the day,” said Crawford.
Crawford deserve a C minus rather than a B minus. He struggled and looked bad against a fighter that arguably lost his last fight against 2nd tier fighter Ray Robinson.
I disagree that Crawford defeated Kavaliauskas in “tremendous fashion” as he says he did in his 9th round knockout on December 14. The reality is, Crawford dropped Kavaliauskas with a rabbit punch to the back of his head. The referee should have waived off the rabbit punch knockdown due to the shot being an illegal punch.
