By Sam Volz: Trainer Kenny Porter says he doesn’t think it’s a good idea for Errol Spence Jr. to return to the ring this year to fight Terence Crawford in a rematch after the sustained beating he took last weekend in his ninth round technical knockout loss.
Spence has a rematch clause in the contract, with a time limit written in, stating the second fight must happen this year, leaving Errol with no choice but to fight Crawford in December.
Kenny feels that Spence (28-1, 22 KOs) took much punishment over the course of the nine rounds for him to return to the ring in December to fight Crawford (40-0, 31 KOs) in a rematch.
Porter also thinks Crawford needs to rest for the remainder of this year as well because he went through a grueling training camp and invested a lot of mental energy into this fight.
Although Crawford didn’t take a lot of punishment in the fight with Spence, he had a hard camp and likely took many shots while preparing.
Kenny says he thinks Spence should have been pulled out of the fight after the sixth round when it was clear that he’d lost every round and needed a knockout to win. With Spence’s power and speed not present, he wasn’t going to score a knockout to pull out a victory.
“Me, personally, I wouldn’t want to see that, but if he decides to go for that and they make that at 154, I know he’s going to do better. He believes in himself, and he’s a warrior, and he believes he can beat Terence,” said Kenny Porter to Fight Hub TV about Errol Spence Jr. wanting a rematch with Terence Crawford.
“That opportunity should be three for him if everything is in place in terms of his health. Definitely not this year. This year, to me, is over with.
Spence should have been pulled out earlier
“Definitely there,” said Kenny when asked if he would have halted the fight in the seventh round after Crawford dropped Spence twice. After six rounds in a fight, and you haven’t won any of them, there’s no way you can come back on those scores.
“On the scorecards, you can’t come back. You need a knockout to come back. You, as a trainer, you can see that your guy isn’t going to be able to come back from this.
“He’s down too far on the cards; he doesn’t have the power on the pop on his punches, and he’s not able to hit this guy with anything substantial to change the direction of this fight. So as each goes on, he’s just taking more and more punishment. So, I would have definitely said, ‘That’s enough, son. We’ve had enough. That’s it; we’re done.’
“It’s also up to the trainer to say, ‘My guy is not going to win this fight,” said Kenny.
