Why bother with Crawford?

WBC and WBO world super lightweight champion Terence Crawford and his trainer Brian McIntyre have been attempting to goad Sen. Manny Pacquiao into a big-money fight next year. McIntyre has been particularly vocal, but a lot of his reasoning doesn’t seem to pass muster. The eight-division world champion has nothing to gain by fighting a smaller opponent. He is way past that, and wouldn’t want to look back over a weight class he conquered easily years ago.

When this writer covered the Pacquiao-Vargas WBO world title fight last month, Crawford’s name did come up in discussions with the press. But his potential as a future Pacquiao opponent was generally panned, since Pacquiao has no history of going down in weight. This week, McIntyre has been making a lot of noise, implying that the Filipino champion has been avoiding Crawford, choosing instead a third fight with Timothy Bradley and the title bout with Jessie Vargas. It seems very unlikely.

To begin with, as Freddie Roach repeatedly says, Pacquiao “has nothing more to prove in the world of boxing.” Roach, who has been with the Filipino champion for the uncommonly long period of 16 years, thought that Pacquiao would retire after the first Mayweather fight, and now reiterates that hope in the event of a rematch in late 2017. 

“I knew he was special, that we’d win maybe one or two world titles,” Roach told this writer in November. “But I didn’t think we would win eight. He’s done everything that can be done in boxing.”

Except maybe move down in weight.

Pacquiao first claimed a world super lightweight belt when he demolished Ricky Hatton in two rounds in May of 2009, claiming the International Boxing Organization version of the title in the process. Since then, Pacquiao has been fighting at welterweight, only going further up in weight in a catchweight superfight against Antonio Margarito in November of 2011. Pacquiao has been very comfortable at welterweight, having fought 11 times at that weight since beating Hatton. That’s the longest the sitting senator has been at any single weight since he became a world champion since his early days as a flyweight two decades ago.

McIntyre is making the case that Oscar dela Hoya gave Pacquiao a similar break when they fought in December of 2008, immediately before the Hatton fight. But the fact is, at that time, the 35-year old Dela Hoya had not fought at that weight in six years, so moving down was difficult for him. Also, at the time they faced off, Pacquiao was already a six-division world champion, which Crawford is not. The current WBC and WBO super lightweight champion has also been world lightweight champion, so any comparisons between him now and Pacquiao in 2008 are somewhat far-fetched. They aren’t at the same level.

McIntyre also implies that Roach has a lot to do with the decision not to fight Crawford. Roach trained former WBC world super lightweight champion Viktor Postol, which lost the belt to Crawford in July. To be fair, that was only Postol’s first loss in 29 fights, and it went to the scorecards. Crawford has knocked out 20 of his 29 opponents thus far, so perhaps the win wasn’t as impactful as they make it out to be.

When Pacquiao fights at 147 pounds, he weighs in at about 144 or so, then puts on just a few pounds before the fight. His naturally bigger, nutritionally deprived opponents pack on much more weight before fight time, and can weigh in the neighborhood of 160. This, Roach has repeatedly explained, is the reason why Pacquiao has had difficulty knocking people out in the last seven years. Still, they have managed to be successful at higher and higher weight classes. So there is no challenge in stepping down in weight. 

Crawford would get the attention of the entire sporting world, a fat paycheck, and a chance to say he fought one of the greatest of all time. But his being smaller increases the likelihood of his getting knocked out, as well. Pacquiao will be doing him a service by saying yes, so what’s the point? It may serve Crawford’s team well to think this through a little more.