Before his last fight, Terence Crawford said facing Saul ‘Canelo‘ Alvarez was his ultimate goal. This week, it was taken off the table entirely.
The two-time undisputed, four-division champion made a successful super-welterweight debut against previously undefeated Israil Madrimov, winning a hard-fought unanimous decision in Los Angeles.
During the card, Riyadh Season’s Turki Alalshikh announced that he had made an offer to Canelo, who hasn’t been overly keen on the fight but said he would take it if the money was right.
Just days later, Alalshikh publicly revoked the offer saying he was no longer interested in the fight. Canelo – who was on a press tour to hype his super-middleweight title defence against Edgar Berlanga – guessed that Alalshikh did so because he said no to a meeting as he was focused on his upcoming fight and nothing else.
The one man who hadn’t weighed in on it all was Crawford, until an interview on The Porter Way Podcast. The 36-year-old from Omaha revealed that the Canelo fight was his main motivator left in the sport.
“To be honest that [Canelo] fight was my motivation.
If it’s all about business then you doing good business. If I’m easy work, which I heard him say, then if I’m easy work you know you would make all that money that he’s getting offered – but yet still he want $200m for Benavidez and he want $150m to fight me, so that just lets me know right there that I’m a threat to him and his legacy.
It would be crazy for a guy that started at 135 to come all the way up to 168, no catchweight, and dethrone you, so he’s got that in the back of his head. It’s a big risk for him.”
Asked if he might consider retirement now the Canelo clash looks unlikely, Crawford admitted it was ‘something to talk about’.
“Man. It’s something to talk about. You know, there are things that we talk about. Right now I’m still doing what I do, Canelo has got a fight coming up so I never want to make it about me and Canelo.”
Canelo faces Berlanga on September 14 in Las Vegas, going head-to-head with an Alalshikh sponsored UFC event ten minutes away. Crawford, should he fight on, is expected to return in the first quarter of 2025.
