By: Hans Themistode
Errol Spence Jr. and Terence Crawford have been dancing around each other for years now. Most of the world has the pair ranked at the very top of the welterweight division. Deciding who is the better all-around fighter is a question that has yet to be answered, and by all accounts, it doesn’t seem as though we’ll find out anytime soon.
Recently, Spence Jr. has made expressed a desire to jump up two or three weight classes to take on four-division titlist Canelo Alvarez.
While many have viewed Spence Jr.’s ambitions as brazen, former two-division champion Tim Bradley views his desire to do so as money-hungry.
“Why would go up and face Canelo but you won’t face Terence Crawford in the same weight class as you?” Said Bradley during a recent discussion with Andre Ward, Mark Kriegel and Joe Tessitore. “That’s a money thing for him.”
In the case of Alvarez, the Mexican superstar is viewed by many as the number one fighter in the world. He’s also considered the sport’s number one attraction, routinely raking in tens of millions of dollars for each appearance in the ring.
In his most recent bout which took place last week against former WBA/Ring magazine super-middleweight champion Callum Smith, Alvarez reportedly pulled in north of 20 million for his one-sided victory. In September of 2018, Alvarez signed a 10 fight, 350 million dollar deal with DAZN. Although their contract has since been terminated, Alvarez continues to see lucrative offers, including a three-fight deal worth $75 million from Premier Boxing Champions (PBC) earlier this year.
With a career-high payday likely if he were to secure a showdown with Alvarez, although Spence Jr. (27-0, 21 KOs) is only 30 years of age, Bradley believes that the Dallas product simply wants to load up his duffle bag with cash and exit stage left.
“I think that Spence is at a point now and correct me if I’m wrong but I think he just wants to get the money and leave the game.”
For Bradley, a matchup between Spence Jr. and Crawford is one that he fantasizes about but doesn’t expect to happen. One constant issue that has prevented the two from fighting one another is Spence Jr.’s association with PBC and Crawford’s alignment with Top Rank. With that said, Crawford is currently under contract with Top Rank for only one more year. A possible landing spot for Crawford once his contract does expire is PBC.
Still, even if Crawford were to sign on the dotted line with the same promotional outfit as Spence Jr., Bradley still won’t get his hopes up.
“He has no intentions of fighting Terence Crawford. Even if Terence Crawford was to jump ship and go over there to PBC, I still don’t see the fight happening.”