Trainer Abel Sanchez says Canelo Alvarez is going to be hitting Terence Crawford on his arms and to the body to wear him down on September 13th. He doesn’t think Crawford (41-0, 31 KOs) will be able to avoid getting hit by moving because he’s not going to have the feet at 168 that he did at 147.
Sanchez says Crawford should have already started fighting bigger guys during his year out of the ring. Terence opted to wait for his clash against Canelo, rather than using his time to prepare with tune-ups at 168.
Crawford’s Missed Training Opportunity
“I would have had him fighting bigger guys, and doing a lot more strength and conditioning because he’s going to need that,” said trainer Abel Sanchez to Johnny Boy Boxing about what he’d have done to prepare Terence Crawford for the fight against Canelo Alvarez.
Sanchez has the right idea. Crawford should have used the year that he’s been out of the ring to take a couple of tune-ups at 168 to get adjusted to the weight before fighting Canel. For whatever reason, Terence chose to sit inactive, just focusing on bulking up. It was a missed opportunity, but it shows that he was afraid to take a risk of something bad happening.
“He’s going to be faster in the first three or four rounds because he is faster than Canelo. But once Canelo starts pounding on his arms and pounding on him, it’s a big truck hitting him,” said Sanchez. “It’s going to be difficult to stay away from him unless he does the [William] Scull fight. But I don’t think he’s got the legs, especially at 168, that he had at 147.”
Terence didn’t even have the legs at 154. We saw that Israil Madrimov was faster on his feet and landed the better shots. Crawford won’t dare even attempt to turn the fight into a Tom and Jerry fight because he won’t want to anger Turki Alalshikh. He’s paying him a lot of money, and Crawford will feel obligated to entertain, even if it results in him getting knocked out.
Canelo to Break Down Crawford
“Of course, it’s going to help him [Crawford] at the beginning of the fight when Canelo is still trying to assimilate his speed,” said Sanchez when asked if Crawford’s high boxing IQ will help him against Alvarez. “Once he catches up to certain things Crawford does, he’s going to hit him.”
Crawford’s speed might not be an advantage for him even in the early rounds. The weight that he’s put on will slow him down, and it’ll make him a lot easier to hit by Canelo. He’s going to try to outbox Canelo the way Floyd Mayweather Jr did, but he lacks the hand speed that he had.