Written by: Sean Crose
Naysayers will leave Saturday’s junior middleweight title fight in Los Angeles convinced that Terence Crawford will never beat Canelo Alvarez. Even four-time champion Crawford is over the hill. Perhaps these people are right on both counts. Maybe not. However, where they are wrong, is in their perception. Crawford moved up from welterweight to junior middleweight and fought the incredibly talented Israil Madrimov in an intense back-and-forth bout of top-quality boxing this past weekend. Crawford’s performance against Madrimov on Saturday was extremely impressive. That, not speculation, should be the story.
Crawford agreed with Madrimov after the fight was over. “I was wondering what was going on, but I was patient. I didn’t want to rush into anything; I was caught like that a few times, trying to eat quickly.” Such things happen when one faces an opponent of Madrimov’s caliber. “Israel was a tough opponent,” Crawford continued. “I knew he would be difficult, I knew everything about him when I went to Uzbekistan. He’s really strong, he’s tough, he’s taken a lot of good shots. He put me in round 12. He had quick feet, good rhythm up top, and was tough. And he was waiting to contradict me, just as I was trying to contradict him.”
There may be an assumption among boxing fans that a marquee fighter cannot perform well unless he does so against another marquee fighter. Such thinking is ridiculous, of course, but the bottom line is that a large portion of the boxing community still considers Errol Spence to be a greater threat to Crawford than Madrimov was. Maybe this is just human nature, but it doesn’t make a lot of sense.
Still, when a fighter is as good as Crawford, it’s naturally disappointing when that fighter doesn’t completely recruit and destroy his latest opponent. Such things happened to Mike Tyson, and now they are happening to Crawford. Greatness obviously comes with a price, and that price is high – high – expectations. Boxing fans are a stubborn bunch. Then again, people want to be entertained when they pay the better part of a hundred dollars for a prepaid credit card. Fortunately for Crawford, he is often one of the most entertaining players in the sport.
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