His Excellency Turki Alalshikh says he’s no longer interested in putting together a fight between Terence Crawford and Canelo Alvarez.
(Credit: Melina Pizano/Matchroom)
Turki doesn’t give his reasons for giving up on his plans for the Canelo vs. Crawford fight, but it would seem obvious that Crawford’s recent struggles against Israil Madrimov last Saturday night at 154 is a good reason.
Crawford (41-0, 31 KOs) won a highly questionable 12-round unanimous decision against Madrimov and looked all of his 36-year-old age. That performance showed that Crawford was too weak and old to move up to 168 to take on Canelo Alvarez for his WBA, WBC, and WBO super middleweight titles.
Turki Shifts Focus to the US Market
“I decided to discard the Canelo fight, as I don’t want it anymore,” Turki Alalshikh said on social media. “Instead, I will be focusing for the US market with bigger fights, especially for the legend Crawford.”
Canelo-Crawford was always viewed as a money grab by fans. Crawford was upfront about his reasons for wanting the fight, repeatedly mentioning that he wanted the money.
Terence wouldn’t move up and earn the fight by running the gauntlet against David Benavidez, David Morrell, and Christian Mbilli. Crawford just wanted to fight Canelo at 168, and absolutely nothing was sporting about this horrible fight.
His Excellency Turki says he’s still focusing on Crawford, who turns 37 next September, but he doesn’t say who he wants to match him with. U.S. boxing fans want to see Crawford fight the young phenom Jaron ‘Boots’ Ennis, but Turki may need to encourage him to do that because he and his trainer, Brian ‘BoMac’ McIntyre, haven’t been interested in taking that fight. They don’t want Boots.
Boots Ennis: The Crawford Upgrade?
Some fans view Boots as a copy of Crawford with superior power, aggression, and a more exciting fighting style. Ennis is like an ultra version of Crawford with a fearless, fan-friendly style. He’s like a mix of Crawford, Canelo, and Gennadiy Golovkin. If you put them all in a pot and stirred them around, you’d get Boots Ennis.
Boots doesn’t waste time boxing from the outside, playing it safe, as we saw with Crawford in his fight against Madrimov last weekend.
If you put Boots in with Madrimov, there wouldn’t have been fan booting. Boots would have been on Madrimov, firing power shots and going to war.
Assuming Crawford continues to avoid the dangerous Boots Ennis like the plague, this leaves these fighters as options for the Nebraska native before he retires:
– Vergil Ortiz Jr.
– Serhii Bohachuk
– Sebastian Fundora
– Tim Tszyu
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