Tim Bradley got on his soapbox this week to push Canelo Alvarez to give Terence Crawford the fight he asked for against him.
It’s the fight Crawford, 37, desperately wants, but has eluded him due to his unwillingness to earn it through hard work by defeating the top dogs at 168 & 175.
Golden Parachute
Bradley insists unified super middleweight champion Canelo (62-2-2, 39 KOs) is not “running away” from a fight against Crawford. This fight does nothing for Canelo. It is seen as a vehicle for Crawford to get the golden parachute to give him a soft landing in retirement and allow him to comfortably live into his golden years in a giant mansion in Beverly Hills.
Crawford (41-0, 31 KOs) looked awful in his last fight against 154-lb champion Israil Madrimov on August 3 and showed that he has reached the limit of how far he can go in moving up divisions. Terence ate right hands from Madrimov all night and looked like an old man in that fight. Why would Canelo want to fight Crawford after that performance?
“Canelo, don’t run from this. You already ran away from the Benavidez fight,” Tim Bradley said to his YouTube channel, talks about wanting Canelo Alvarez to fight Terence Crawford. “Anyway, you don’t care what people have to say about you for not taking up the fight.
“You walk across Mexico and you obviously don’t care about what people think of you not to take that fight. Make the fight with Crawford. It’s a fight that everybody wants to see you take, and it’s going to give Crawford the opportunity to show you his greatness and show the world,” Bradley continued.
“Everyone talks about the weight. “Oh, he’s going to knock him out.” When was the last time Canelo knocked someone out? You can stop with that, “He’s going to knock out Crawford.” Canelo is the same height as Crawford (5’8″). Canelo started at 147 pounds. He’s not a natural 168 pounds,” Bradley said.
Canelo is much bigger, stronger and more talented than Crawford. Fans saw 37-year-old Terence Israil Madrimov barely beat in his debut at 154 last August, and they rightly see that the Nebraska native is too small and old to move up 14 pounds to 168 to beat Canelo for his challenging unified titles. .
Test ground
If Crawford was willing to prove himself by moving up to 168 and running the rig through David Benavidez, David Morrell, Artur Beterbiev and Christian Mbilli, fans will not be averse to this fight. But since Crawford isn’t willing to do that, he’s not judging a fight against King Canelo. He is ignored like other needy fighters begging Alvarez to give them an undeserved fight.
To meet with the King, you have to do something big. It has always been this way. Crawford tries to skip that part and just begs for the fight or others try to pressure Canelo on his behalf.
“We just saw a fighter (Oleksandr Usyk) who was 50 pounds lighter than the other guy (Tyson Fury) that he faced, and he beat him. He beat him with his skill, ability, heart and determination. Usyk is a great fighter. You know who else is a big one is Crawford,” Bradley said.
The difference is that the 36-year-old Tyson Fury is completely washed up in the clinical sense, always overrated and manufactured, thanks to the careful matchmaking done by his promoters.
Canelo is not a hype job and has real talent to go along with his power and size. More importantly, he is a proven PPV draw. Crawford is not a PPV draw and never will be. This fight is all about helping Crawford financially and making his fans, like Bradley, happy.
This fight does nothing for Canelo. If Bradley really cared, he would position Crawford to take on the killers in the 154-lb division, which includes many he has yet to fight. Bakhram Muratazaliev is waiting for Crawford, and if he wants to cement his legacy, he needs to fight him.
