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In two weeks time, we will be treated to the highest level boxing match we will see in 2023. Terence Crawford and Errol Spence Jr., who are ranked third and fourth in Ring Magazine’s pound for pound rankings respectively, will face off in an epic clash for the undisputed Welterweight World Championship. The bout has boxing and MMA fans alike salivating at the idea and after years of working to the fight, it finally seems it will happen, barring any disaster.
But Terence Crawford and Errol Spence are fighting for more than just the undisputed title. The two are following up on an example set earlier this year by Gervonta Davis and Ryan Garcia. Boxing has wallowed in politics and business for a couple of decades now. Fans aren’t getting the fights they want to see when they should see them. Tune ups, mandatories, and flat out ducking have been the name of the game for so long that fans who want to like boxing all say the same thing: “boxing is dead.” Crawford and Spence will show that is not the case and going forward, more mega fights can be expected.
Terence Crawford vs. Errol Spence: The Fights That Matter
For years, MMA fans have been getting best of boxing fans in getting the important fights. For years, the UFC has been giving fans the right fights. We’ve been given mega fights with titles on the line and fights between two of tomorrow’s stars. Boxing, on the other hand, gave fans Roy Jones Jr. versus Julio Cesar Gonzales and Wladimir Klitschko versus Jean-Marc Mormeck. The 2010’s were rife with fights that just didn’t matter.
MMA consistently had fights like Conor McGregor versus Jose Aldo, Fedor Emelianeko versus Mirko Cro Cop, and Jose Aldo versus Chad Mendes, fights that featured the best versus the best. But since the COVID era of the UFC, shuffling in a litany of APEX events with little to no substance, there’s been a glut of fans reminiscing over the “old days.”
Enter boxing.
The sport of boxing’s latest renaissance began in 2020. Instead of turning into a corporate content machine after the pandemic, boxing has taken the time to emerge better than going in. Canelo Alvarez unified super middleweight in the heat of the pandemic by beating Callum Smith, Billy Joe Saunders and Caleb Plant. He found the best guys and fought them.
In 2022 alone we saw Katie Taylor and Amanda Serrano battle in the highest touted women’s boxing match in a really, really long time. Oleksandr Usyk rematched Anthony Joshua after beating him in September of 2021. Shakur Stevenson defeated Oscar Valdez.
2023 Hasn’t slowed down. As I mentioned earlier, Gervonta Davis and Ryan Garcia started this off. Fans wanted to see that fight, title or no title. That fight sold 800,000 pay per views. Nothing to sneeze at. Devin Haney, after winning the undisputed titles, took on Vasiliy Lomachenko in a fight that he really didn’t need to take. But it was a fight people wanted to see.
Now we get to the big dogs. The king of kings in the boxing world. There’s not a higher profile matchup that can be made aside from Terence Crawford and Errol Spence. While Davis, Garcia, Haney and Lomachenko are doing the right thing and taking hard, legacy making fights, Crawford and Spence can shift the paradigm. While the others fighting are great fights, it’s nothing like the pound for pound fight like this.
Fans have been craving this fight. And the fight’s not been all politics or business. In October of 2019, Errol Spence was involved in a horrible car wreck that had him sidelined for some time.
After seeing a wreck like the one above, who can blame him for taking his time to get back. Something like that can take years off of your life and Spence, being in a sport of bloodletting, has so much more than just his dignity to lose if he steps into the ring compromised.
Boxing Back In Style
Terence Crawford and Errol Spence will fight because that is what boxers do. They fight the hard fight to see who the best in the world is. It sets an example that if the right fights are made, the fans will flock to the stadiums and buy the pay per view card at home. It says, “Hey Tyson Fury, hey Oleksandr Usyk, fight. You’ll make a crap-ton of money.” It says “Dmitry Bivol and Artur Beterbiev, y’all should unify.” Tank, Haney and Stevenson should figure their round robin out.
And I believe this is happening. Before Crawford and Spence, we have Naoya Inoue, the former undisputed bantamweight champion, taking on Stephen Fulton, a two belt super bantamweight champ. There’s the Tyson Fury-Francis N’Gannou fight that people seem to be excited for. Deontay Wilder and Andy Ruiz are on a collision course. And, of course, King Canelo is taking on Jermell Charlo in an undisputed versus undisputed fight.
Boxing is on it’s way back. Classic fights like Roberto Duran versus Sugar Ray Leonard and Muhammad Ali versus George Foreman are being made right now. It’s Terence Crawford versus Errol Spence. It’s Naoya Inoue versus Stephen Fulton. It’s (hopefully) Tyson Fury versus Oleksandr Usyk. Terence Crawford and Errol Spence are setting the example for the stars. It’s up to them to tell the businessmen to piss off and fight the real fights.
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