By Norm Frauenheim-
It’s a move up, on the scale and to the top of the ballot.
Terence Crawford’s bid to own next year opens with a jump to welterweight and a convincing campaign for Fighter of the Year.
Call it a win-win, at least that’s what it looks like from this corner.
After dominating the 140-pound division, Crawford moves up to 147, with his debut at the new weight probably against Jeff Horn, who followed up his controversial stunner over Manny Pacquiao with an 11th-round stoppage of somebody named Gary Corcoran in Brisbane Wednesday.
If the deal gets done for a bout sometime this spring perhaps in Las Vegas, promoter Bob Arum says Horn has a better chance than anybody will ever give him.
Fair enough. Arum warned everybody that Horn had a chance against Pacquiao, too. But Pacquiao looked to be as unprepared as he is over-the-hill.
Crawford is neither. He’s motivated and near his prime in terms of instinct, athleticism and motivation. Add what appears to be a mean streak, and you’ve got a fighter very hard to stop for at least the next year.
I know, I know, there is Vasiliy Lomachenko, who is being marketed as boxing’s cutting edge of newfound creativity.
His complement of footwork and angles is thing of beauty, to be sure. Still, there’s some debate about whether there’s more form than function to what he does.
Maybe, we’ll get better judge of that against the fundamentally efficient Mikey Garcia.We sure didn’t get to see it against Guillermo Rigondeaux, who quit after six rounds Saturday in a hyped bout that proved to underwhelming.
Don’t blame Lomachenko, who did exactly what he had to. This on is on Rigondeaux, the sad-faced Cuban who surrendered for what was reported to be a bruised hand. Rigondeaux surrendered, perhaps because he knew defeat was inevitable.
Net result: It denied Lomchenko the chance to finish a fight that might have embellished his own candidacy for Fighter of the Year.
For now, Lomachenko is still that proverbial work in progress. Meanwhile, he’s as likable for his footwork as he is for his honesty and quick wit. His post-fight take on his name — “No-mas-chenko” — is a classic.
He continues to say he wants to fight Mikey Garcia, despite Garcia’s biter split with Top Rank, still the Ukrainian’s promoter. Lomachenko’s priorities are in order.
He’s the boss. In the end, the promoter is there to get him fights he wants. And in this case, Lomachenko-versus-Garcia is a fight the public wants to see too.
A year from now, Lomachenko’s clear business agenda and evolving ring style could make him Fighter of the Year.
In the here-and now, however, it’s Crawford, who exercised his dominance in a stunning third-round stoppage of Julius Indongo in August. Unlike Rigondeaux, Indongo was never the story in that one. Only Crawford was.
Now, there’s Crawford’s move to welterweight. There are interesting fights for him at 147. But the guess here is that he would beat Keith Thurman. He’d beat Shawn Porter. He’d blow out Pacquiao. Of all the possibilities at welterweight, the best might be the young Errol Spence. But that one looks to be at least a year away, a year after one that will belong to Terence Crawford.
