LAS VEGAS – Four of the top 10 boxers in the world – Terence Crawford, Errol Spence Jr., Naoya Inoue and Stephen Fulton – will be in action this week. In a normal week in the 21st century, that would mean that boxers would be competing in four separate fights.
That’s not the case this week though, luckily for boxing fans who have long been overlooked, underappreciated and fed leftovers. The week begins on Tuesday with Inoue and Fulton, undefeated fighters with a long history of success, meeting in Tokyo for Fulton’s unified super bantamweight belt. It will end what looks to be an epic fight between Crawford and Spence, both undefeated fighters entitled to the welterweight title, facing off for the undisputed belt here on Saturday at T-Mobile Arena.
It’s four elite boxers, in their prime, facing each other in the same week in meaningful fights that also feel like incredible fights.
For a while, the Crawford-Spence fight looked like it was on its way to becoming the modern version of Floyd Mayweather versus Manny Pacquiao. From late 2009 to early 2015, the #1 question most boxing writers were asked was a simple one: Do you think Mayweather and Pacquiao will fight?
They finally did on May 2, 2015, in an extraordinary event that set a record for pay-per-view sales, generating over $600 million in revenue. In 2023 dollars, that would be $770 million.
Crawford and Spence have had their eyes on each other for years, and Crawford left Top Rank when his contract expired on 20 November 2021 after defeating Shawn Porter because he felt that Top Rank were unable to make a deal with the Premier Boxing Champions for him to fight Spence.
Even after Crawford was free of Top Rank though, the fight wasn’t done quickly. Spence fought Yordenis Ugas, not Crawford, on April 16, 2022. Crawford fought David Avanesyan, not Spence, on December 10, 2022.
Traditional powers have failed to put up the fight. Then Crawford picked up the phone and spoke directly to Spence. They reached an agreement because each wanted to fight the other.
“We couldn’t pass by and not have this fight [occur],” Crawford told Yahoo Sports. “It meant a lot to both of us.”
The result is a battle that, on paper, ranks among the greatest welterweight bouts in the history of the sport. The welterweight division has been one of the glamor divisions in the sport, along with the heavyweight and middleweight divisions, and has produced some of the most memorable fights of all time.
Over the last 50 years, there have been welterweight fights such as Sugar Ray Leonard and Roberto Duran, Leonard against Thomas Hearns, Leonard against Wilfred Benitez, Mayweather against Pacquiao, Pernell Whitaker against Julio Cesar Chavez Sr., Whitaker against Oscar De La Hoya, De La Hoya against Shane Mosley, Mayweather against Miguel Cotto and Cotto facing Pacquiao.
Crawford and Spence fit perfectly into this group. Crawford, the WBO champion, is 39-0 with 30 KOs and is ranked number 1 pound for pound by Yahoo Sports. Spence, who was ranked #5 on Yahoo Sports but was removed due to inactivity in May, is 28-0 with 22 knockouts. He holds the IBF, WBA and WBC belts.
One of the things that makes the fight attractive is that as good as Crawford and Spence are, the likelihood of them raising their games is high.
“There’s no question these two guys are going to take their games to a whole different level,” Spence coach Derrick James told Yahoo Sports. “They will be different fighters, I believe, for facing each other. To win, you can’t be like you used to be, because these guys are facing a totally different type of opponent. This is true for Errol as well as for Crawford. And so I think it’s going to be a spectacular fight because of that.”
Coming so close to a super bantamweight title fight between Inoue, Yahoo Sports’ second pound-for-pound fighter, and Fulton, who is 10th, gives sports fans one more reason to feel like the tide is turning.
Many of the unification matches and high profile matches that in the past were not done were made in 2023.
With great new talent entering the sport on a regular basis and fighters, promoters, managers and broadcasters working together to make the best fights on a regular basis, the prospects for the sport are definitely better.
Fighters tend to be shut out of the public during camp, but Spence said at a media workout last week that he’s been listening to his fans regularly, a sign of interest in the fight.
“I’ve been feeling the buzz for this fight,” said Spence. “Wherever I go, they always ask me about this fight. I knew I had to make this happen. This is what everyone wanted. We have to prove who’s the guy at welterweight and boxing. The winner of this fight is the best fighter in boxing, period.”