Top Rank boss Bob Arum announced that WBO welterweight champion Terence Crawford (36-0, 27 KOs) will be defending against Kell Brook (39-2, 27 KOs) on November 14th on ESPN.
Crawford-Brook won’t be on pay-per-view, according to Arum. He’s choosing not to put the fight on PPV due to the pandemic. Arum understands that there are many people unemployed right now, and he’s not going to put a further strain on the U.S public by charging them to see Crawford and Brook on ESPN.
Top Rank will reveal the venue for the fight once they decide whether to stage it in Las Vegas, Nevada, or in Omaha, Nebraska. That’s where the 33-year-old Crawford is hoping it’ll be. Former IBF welterweight champion Brook says he wants to fight in Las Vegas.
Crawford has been anxious to fight a big name his entire career, and now he’s finally getting a chance after 12 years in the game. Brook a few years past it at 34, but he’s someone that used to be a big name before he ran into Errol Spence Jr and Gennadiy Golovkin.
Kell’s eye injuries in those fights have been repaired, and he’s been ready for an important fight since 2018. It’s just taken Brook a little bit longer than expected to be given another shot at a big fight.
With that said, Brook hasn’t helped himself by chooses to fight guys that couldn’t help his career in Sergey Rabchenki, Michael Zerafa, and Mark DeLuca. Brook moved up to 154 in 2018, but he hasn’t seemed enthusiastic in taking on any of the talented fighters in the division for some reason.
Kell could have fought Jarrett Hurd and Jermell Charlo if he wanted to, but he’s taken it easy by facing DeLuca and Zerafa. It’s possible that Brook’s confidence was knocked out of him in his consecutive defeats to GGG and Errol.
Brook will need to have confidence for him to have a shot at beating Crawford because he will be giving him a lot of different looks in this fight. Crawford mixes things up a lot in his fights by boxing and slugging at different times.
If Terence is uncomfortable with Brook’s power, don’t be surprised if he gets on his bike and plays keep away. When Crawford fights that way, he uses his jab a lot to keep his opponents from getting at him. Brook has a pretty good jab, so this could be interesting to see how this fight evolves.
Crawford is ranked high on the pound-for-pound lists, but that stuff doesn’t mean anything when fighting. If Brook can put hands on Crawford, he’ll have a good chance of beating him.
Crawford hasn’t been fighting the elite-level fighters during his career, which makes it difficult to know whether he’s good if he’s someone who took advantage of how he’s been matched. His best opponent to date in his career is Amir Khan, but he didn’t look good in beating him .
Crawford stopped Khan with a low blow in the sixth round last year in April 2019. It was a bad way for Terence to win, but he couldn’t do much after Khan chose not to continue fighting.
“These networks have to understand how people are hurting, how many people in this country and in the U.K. are out of work because of this pandemic,” Arum said.
“I think it’s really immoral to require people to spend [more] money watching their favorite sport every week, every other week.”
With the Crawford vs. Brook fight taking place on November 14th, there won’t likely be a crowd for the fight because it’s still too early for fans to be allowed back into events.
Crawford is coming off of a knockout win over Egidijus Kavaliauskas last December. Terence looked good in that fight against a big puncher, who dropped him at one point in the contest but wasn’t given credit.
