Terence Crawford says he’d like to fight Errol Spence next year if he can’t get his number one choice opponent Manny Pacquiao, but he doesn’t care if the contest with the IBF/WBA 147-lb champion doesn’t take place.
With Spence saying last week that he wants a 60/40 split to fight Crawford, the Nebraska native says they won’t fight. Crawford will not accept taking the small end of the purse split against Spence.
WBO welterweight champion Crawford (37-0, 28 KOs) reiterates that Spence (26-0, 21 KOs) needs him more than he does him. Another thing Crawford says for a fight between him and Spence to happen, he’ll need to be given the 60/40 split of the money.
Crawford believes that he’s earned the right to take the larger slice of the pie, given that he’s done more in the sport than the 30-year-old Spence. As a former three-division world champion, Crawford is heads and shoulders above Spence’s one-division championship status.
Crawford will target a fight against Spence next if his promoters at Top Rank are unable to land the fight against WBA welterweight champion Pacquiao (62-7-2, 39 KOs), but if it doesn’t happen, he won’t be bothered.
Crawford states that he’ll continue to fight the best available opponents that are interested in facing him.
Crawford wants Pacquiao
“I’m not on cloud nine because I felt like I did something that was already written,” said Crawford about his win over Kell Brook. “It ain’t nothing that I do that surprises me because I already told everybody what I was going to do.
“I told him [Brook] I was going to beat his b**** a** when I told him. Yeah, I want Pacquiao because that’s a fight I’ve been looking to get for years.
“I feel like that’s a fight that I really want at this point in time. Hell yeah, to beat Pacquiao and capture that belt [WBA 147-lb title], that is a good look.
“Given the circumstances of Pacquiao’s last two performances for me to do something that the last fighter and Keith Thurman couldn’t do to dethrone him.
“Yeah, that’s a good look. Let everybody say that I’m fighting no-name ‘Green Machine’ and washed up Kell Brook,” said Crawford.
It doesn’t matter if Crawford wants the Pacquiao fight because it’s probably not going to happen. Pacquiao has Mikey Garcia, an easy mark, that he can make money off when he returns to the ring. Enough casual boxing fans will want to see Pacquiao and Mikey fight for it to be successful on pay-per-view.
It won’t be competitive, but that’s beside the point. Crawford is not likely to fight with Manny, and it would be better for him to be speaking of more realistic options.
There’s nothing wrong with Crawford accepting the challenges made to him from Shawn Porter, Yordenis Ugas, or Vergil Ortiz Jr, is there?
Maybe Crawford beats them, and maybe he doesn’t. If Terence really believes he’s the #1 welterweight, he’s got to prove it at some point. He can’t do that by fighting over-the-hill guys like Kell Brook and Amir Khan.
Crawford will target Spence if no Pacquiao
“I already said that I want Spence,” Crawford said when asked ‘who does he want if he can’t get Pacquiao next.’
“But that fight’s not going to happen because he’s already talking a 60/40 deal. If it ain’t 60/40 in my favor, that fight isn’t going to happen. I already accomplished way more than he accomplished in his little career.
“I don’t care. I really don’t care if that fight happens or not,” Crawford said of Spence. “I used to be all up, and I wanted that fight. But the way things have been going the last couple of years, it just rubbed off on me. I don’t care about it anymore.
“If we fight, we fight. If we don’t, we don’t. I’m not the one for the reason it hasn’t happened, and I’m not the one that they say, ‘Oh, you need Spence.’ Why would I need Spence?
“A lot of people say that I need Spence. I don’t need Spence. The fans want Spence. That’s what I hear. A lot of people say, ‘You need Spence.’ I don’t need Spence. What has he accomplished in his career that I haven’t or more?
“What has he accomplished? That’s why I’m considered the #1 pound-for-pound fighter in the world because all of my accolades and numbers speak for themselves.
“I don’t knock a person saying that they think Spence would beat me. I got people to think Spence would beat that, I know.
“My thing is when a person just blatantly because you’re following that person because you think that person will win to disrespect the other fighter.
“‘Ah, you a p*****. You’re scared.’ I mean, come on. Nine times out of ten, if you bring your a** here and get behind that computer or phone, you aren’t going to do anything. But everybody talks so toughly on the Internet nowadays. That’s crazy,” Crawford said.
What’s the point of Crawford targeting Spence if he’s going to be insisting on a 60/40 split? That’s a non-starter, and the same applies to Spence, who always a 60/40 split for the Crawford fight.
It could be that Spence and Crawford’s assistance in taking the bigger split of the revenue could result in the two never fighting.
We also might see the two fighting each other when they’re in their late 30s and no longer in the prime of their careers.
In other words, it would be similar to what we saw with Floyd Mayweather Jr and Pacquiao waiting until near of their primes before they finally fought in 2015.
When they finally fought, it was boring and lacked the action we would have seen if they’d fought when they were younger.
Crawford to fight the best opponent available
“I can’t complain,” said Crawford when asked if he’s happy with the direction his career is going in with Top Rank. “Of course, I want the big fights, but as I said, I’m cool.
“I’m making good money. I’m fighting good names, the names that are good enough for me to fight.
“I know everybody wants me to fight the likes of Danny Garcia, Keith Thurman, Errol Spence, and Shawn Porter. Those fights haven’t happened yet. So I’ve got to fight the next best opponents to fight,” Crawford said.
Spence and Pacquiao are unlikely to fight Crawford next, but there are still some interesting potential matches for Terence if he’s willing to take a risk.
These three highly ranked WBO contenders have all expressed interest in fighting Crawford:
- Shawn Porter
- Vergil Ortiz Jr
- Yordenis Ugas
Crawford, 33, needs to convince his promoters at Top Rank that those are worthwhile opponents for him to fight if he can’t get Spence or Pacquiao.
Yeah, these guys won’t bring in the same kind of money that Spence and Manny will, but they’re a lot better than the fighters Crawford has been facing for the last 12 years of his career.
You can argue that Porter and Ortiz Jr both would beat everyone that Crawford has ever fought before. They wouldn’t lose to former Crawford victims Kell Brook, Amir Khan, Jose Benavidez, Jeff Horn, and Julius Indongo.
If Top Rank believes in Crawford, they’ll let him fight Vergil Ortiz Jr, Porter, or Ugas next if they can’t make a deal with Errol or Pacquiao.
Terence rates Mean Machine highly
“When I look at pound-for-pound, I think ‘how would you be in another weight class?'” said Crawford.
“That’s pound-for-pound. Not if you just conqueror a weight class. How would you do in a weight class above you or below you? I traveled from 135 to 140 to 147 and still dominated every single weight class I’ve ever been in.
“That’s pound-for-pound to me. When people get on here and say, ‘He hasn’t fought anybody,’ I just laugh because they don’t know anything about boxing. The guys that I fought are world-class fighters.
“Just because you’re not a fan of that fighter and you don’t know too much about that fighter, ‘He’s not world-class.’
“If you put Mean Machine in the ring with anyone that you think is a top welterweight and they give them fits if not beat them. But when you’re this good, they’re going to try and down you,” said Crawford.
The pound-for-pound stuff is mainly important for the biggest diehard boxing fan. Crawford needs to look at what’s really important, and that’s for him to become popular in the U.S. Being #1 pound-for-pound won’t result in Crawford making more money.
To do that, he needs to expand his fan base to gt to the level of a pay-per-view attraction. Vasily Lomachenko has been rated #1 pound-for-pound for a long time, and he never became a pay-per-view attraction.
Egidijus ‘Mean Machine’ Kavaliauskas looked poor in fighting to a controversial 10 round draw against fringe contender Ray Robinson in early 2019 before Crawford fought him.
Crawford’s view of ‘Mean Machine’ being one of the best fighters at 147 seems to be a little misguided. There are many welterweights in the division that would likely beat Kavaliauskas, including Robinson, who is still unhappy at not being given a victory against him.
