By Norm Frauenheim –
LAS VEGAS – Only two ounces separated them on the scale. That amounts to a couple of AA batteries, or maybe a tennis ball. It’s not much, somewhere between tiny and imperceptible.
Call it even, a sign perhaps of what to expect in a compelling welterweight fight between Terence Crawford and Shawn Porter Saturday (ESPN + pay-per-view/6 pm PT, 9 pm ET) at Mandalay Bay’s Michelob Ultra Arena.
Betting odds suggest otherwise. They were 6-to-1 in favor of Crawford after he was at 146.4 pounds and Porter at 146.6 Friday at the formal weigh-in.
If those odds are reliable, Crawford will prove what he’s been saying all along. His skillset, he says, is unrivaled at welterweight and perhaps any weight.
It’s a claim he has asserted and re-asserted throughout a pound-for-pound debate that has shifted in favor of Canelo Alvarez, a super-middleweight champion who apparently is planning to fight for a cruiserweight title.
Against the smart and stubborn Porter, Crawford has a chance to punch some real evidence into his pound-for-pound claim.
“Beating a guy like Shawn Porter would boost my resume and my legacy to the next level,’’ Crawford, the World Boxing Organization’s champion, said earlier this week. “I’m not going to be biased. I’m going to be realistic.
“It depends on how I beat Shawn Porter and what fashion.’’
Fashion could mean just about anything. But a stoppage seems to fit best. It would say everything Crawford hopes to.
However, Crawford (37-0, 28 KOs), never a man of many words, said even less Friday. Opening bell is close. He stepped off the scale Friday and only said he wanted to win.
But he punctuated that comment with the intense eyes that appear to to see opportunity in the approaching storm. Lose the opportunity and he has lost the debate.
Porter (31-3-1, 17 KOs) also understands the stakes. He said a few weeks ago that he thought Crawford, unbeaten and a three-division champion, is already in the Hall of Fame. Porter is not quite there yet. But he’s on the brink, he said. An upset of Crawford would put him there.
Despite the seemingly one-sided odds, Porter has a resume that suggests he can spring that upset.
He has lost three fights – to Errol Spence Jr., Keith Thurman and Kell Brook He has a draw with Julio Diaz. He’s been down twice, once against Spence and once against Adrian Broner. That’s the part of his record that says he’s vulnerable.
But here’s what says he has a shot: He’s never been stopped. More significant, perhaps, is that he lost narrowly on the scorecards — a split decision — to Spence before Spence was badly hurt in a car crash. Pre-accident, Crawford-Spence might have been a pick-em fight.
Porter’s gritty resilience against Spence is just one marker that says that he can do what the odds say he can’t.
He knows that, knows it enough to smile straight into the menace projected by Crawford’s unforgiving eyes.
They measured each other throughout an unblinking stare-down during the ritual face-off for nearly 23 seconds after the weigh-in.
Porter finally broke it off, faced the crowd and smiled.
“Terence, you know better than I do that you’ve matured,’’ he said a couple of days before the weigh-in. “I feel like people see your personality and your character right now more than they’ve ever seen, but I feel like I’m still correct in saying that when the wrong Tweet or Instagram post goes up, you can get upset.’’
Upset, maybe, in more ways than one.
