By Chris Williams: Terence Crawford is upset with Errol Spence’s trainer Derrick James after he stated that Terence needs to “raise his profile” for a fight between them to make sense. James says there’s no money in a fight with Crawford he’s not a pay-per-view draw.
Crawford was hoping he could get a fight against Spence this year as long as he’s fully recovered from his car crash, but that doesn’t look like it’s going to happen. If Spence’s trainer James has anything to do with it, Crawford is out of luck as far as a fight against him is concerned.
What James is asking Crawford to do by increasing his profile may be impossible. Crawford has been a pro for 12 years, and he’s never been able to get the big fights that he needed to become a star. The Nebraska native Crawford hasn’t been put in the right type of fights to make him a viable option for Errol this year.
Crawford says James is keeping Spence protected
“I’m starting to notice Derrick James’s is a hater and don’t know s—. All he do is keeping people in protected custody,” said @terencecrawford.
This is what happens when there’s an imbalance in popularity between two fighters. Spence has proven himself to be a pay-per-view attraction with his last two fights against Shawn Porter and Mikey Garcia. As for Crawford, he’s failed to keep up with Spence, due in part to the match-making that’s been for him.
Terence is shooting the messenger here by labeling James as a “hater” when he’s basically telling him like it is. James would obviously be happy if Crawford was a more popular fighter because if that were the situation, a fight between him and Spence would be huge. That’s not the case right now. Crawford isn’t a pay-per-view fighter, and it doesn’t look like he’s going to be.
Derrick wants Crawford to step up and face former WBC welterweight champion, Shawn Porter because that’s the type of fight that would potentially improve his profile. But on the flip side, that’s also a fight that could send Crawford’s carer down the tubes if he loses.
Does Crawford lack ambition?
Crawford might be too comfortable at this point in his career for him to take the risks needed for him to become a star. He’s getting paid well by his promoters at Top Rank to fight the likes of Amir Khan, Egidijus Kavaliauskas and Jose Benavidez. To break free from that level of opposition might be hard for Crawford at this stage. Only he knows what’s holding him back.
If Crawford doesn’t want to fight Porter, he needs to either go back down to 140 to go after the lions that he missed when he was in that division or move up to 154. There are great fights for Crawford potentially in both of those weight classes, and he wouldn’t waste his time-fighting guys that the fans don’t care about.
After five or six years of Crawford’s career, he and his promoters at Top Rank should have taken some risks by fighting guys at junior middleweight. It was clear that Crawford wasn’t getting the fights he needed at 140, so he should have moved up a couple of divisions like Mikey Garcia did and like Leo Santa Cruz is about to do.
Spence vs. Crawford won’t make money – James
“If they really wanted to see Terence Crawford fight Errol Spence, they’d buy his fights when he fights,” said James to Fighthype in talking about the fans not buying his fights on pay-per-view. “It doesn’t make money, so why would we make the fight? Wheres the money going to come from?” said James in talking about why Crawford vs. Spence doesn’t make sense.
Top Rank fighter Teofimo Lopez, who is only 22, has a better shot at becoming a PPV attraction than Crawford, and he’s 10 years younger. The reason for that has to do with the way Teofimo fights. He goes after his opponents trying to knock them out as quickly as possible. Crawford doesn’t do that. He’s a switch-hitting counter puncher and tends to move a lot when his opponents apply pressure.
Crawford’s promoter Bob Arum needs to figure out what he wants to do with him to raise his profile because what he’s been doing hasn’t worked. Arum has used the old school approach of matching Crawford against easy marks in SHOWCASE fights, which has been ineffective.
Long ago that kind of match-making worked to turn fighters into stars, but it doesn’t work now. It takes wins over quality opposition to turn fighters into stars, and when you deviate from that, you get a fighter that can’t draw.
Kell Brook expected to be Crawford’s next opponent
Arum was hoping to pit Crawford against Spence in 2020, and he says he spoke to Al Haymon about the possibility. It’s unclear how long ago Arum spoke to Haymon though because Crawford didn’t beat anyone special last year to make him a good option for Spence. In Crawford’s two fights in 2019, he beat Amir Khan with a low blow and
For fans that don’t know, Crawford has fought a couple of times on pay-per-view against Amir Khan and Viktor Postol, and neither fight brought in big numbers.
Crawford could be fighting Kell Brook next in June. That’s Terence’s plan-B option if his promoter can’t get him a fight against Manny Pacquiao, which does not look like it’s going to happen. Crawford vs. Brook will likely be an identical fight as Crawford-Khan.
Brook is in the same position Khan was when he fought Crawford last year. In other words, Brook is seen as an over-the-hill fighter like Khan, and he’s not a good opponent. Kell, 33, is similar to Jessie Vargas, the fighter that Mikey dug up for his last fight. Brook and Vargas were both briefly world champions at 147, and both hurt their careers with inactivity.