By Chris Williams: Tim Bradley wants Errol Spence Jr (28-0, 22 KOs) to lower his typically super high punch output against Terence Crawford (39-0, 30 KOs) because he feels that gives him his best chance of beating the Omaha, Nebraska native on July 29th.
In looking at the guys that have fought at a slow pace against Crawford in the past, none of them have done well. Not one. That sounds like a stupid idea that Bradley has for Spence.
Spence would be aa fool to fight at a slow pace and be patient against Crawford because that gives the aging fighter his best chance of winning.
When you get an old car with 300,000 miles on it, you got to baby it, not push it too hard, or something will blow. Bradley might want Spence to go easy on his old friend Crawford, but Errol wasn’t born yesterday.
Spence sees the age in Crawford, the diminished hand speed, reflexes, the receding hairline. He’s not going to go easy on him just because Bradley says he should.
This isn’t a ‘give a break to a senior citizen‘ type of fight. Spence is going to take it to the old-timer Crawford, and if he falls apart under pressure, so be it. When you swim with sharks, this is what happens.
Should Errol lower his output?
“Patience. I say that because Crawford is a prolific counterpunch, and if you make a mistake, he’s going to make you pay,” said Tim Bradley to Fighthype when asked what advice he has for Errol Spence Jr for his fight against Terence Crawford.
Does it help Spence by slowing his work rate to a crawl so that the aging 36-year-old Crawford isn’t overwhelmed by incoming fire? For any counter-puncher, the worst thing a fighter can do is slow down their work rate because that works in their favor.
We saw Canelo Alvarez, a classic counter-puncher, was overwhelmed by the high work rate of Dmitry Bivol last year.
With Crawford being a good friend of Bradley, it sounds like Tim is giving Spence his advice to ensure that he doesn’t win and mess up his pal Terence’s career.
“He’s adaptable as well, which makes him even more dangerous because he’s versatile,” Bradley continued fawning over Crawford. “It’s not even about the southpaw and switching and all of that. It’s not even about that. It’s about this [Crawford’s brains]. He can turn it on,” said Bradley.
Crawford becomes a hunter
“He can instantly become a hunter and just want to fight. Will that work in his favor against Errol Spence? Yes and no,” Tim said. “Spence is physically tough, strong, and a great body cruncher on the inside. He can be accurate up top as well, but we saw when he fought Porter, right?
Bradley wants IBF, WBA & WBC welterweight champion Spence to fight cautiously by boxing Crawford, a pure boxer who thrives on fighting guys that fight at a slow pace so that he can dictate the pace.
In other words, Tim wants Spence to throw away his best advantage and fight Crawford’s fight. Errol would be handicapping himself by listening to Bradley give advice.
“What did Porter do? Porter was able to change his rhythm up, bounce on his toes at times, and then he would attack, and then he would stand as close as he possibly can. Then later, he got in that fight with Spence and forced Spence on his back foot, forcing him to try to push him back and working, working on the inside, and he had a lot of success,” said Bradley.
Chris Williams remembers Spence purposefully fighting Shawn Porter’s fight in their bout in 2019 because he knew the fight would be too easy for him if he boxed from the outside.
So instead of completely outclassing Porter like he did against Mikey Garcia by boxing from the outside, Spence took it to the inside and beat Shawn at his own game, dropping him and hammering the stuffing out of him.
It’s worth noting that Porter never looked the same again after that fight. That was the beginning of the end of Porter’s career, and by the time Crawford fought him, he was null & void.
“Many thought that Porter was winning the fight before he got dropped,” said Bradley. “His best work was on the inside, doubling his right hands up, going down to the body. These are things that I feel that Terence, if needs a plan B, if plan A wasn’t working, he can go to that.
“He can step to Spence. Spence, as you know, likes to be in control and everything is all leading off the jab. Once he gets his job going and he starts landing, then everything else starts to work.
“If Spence can’t get his jab working, it’s going to be tough for Spence to make adjustments because, to me, Spence fights the same way every time, the same way. If things are not working for Spence, what he does is, he does exactly what I just said. He steps on the gas.
“It’s patience. The more patient and underneath Spence can be, the more calculated he can be, and the sharper he can be, in maintaining his distance and sharp counters while being himself, dictating the pace but not making mistakes and not lunging forward, not taking those type of risks, the better chance he’s going to have in beating a guy like Crawford,” said Bradley.
