'It makes me laugh' – Terence Crawford rolls his eyes at Canelo Alvarez's 'excuses' and uses Floyd Mayweather example

08/08/2024 10:40

Terence Crawford has quickly shut down two prevalent narratives that have emerged in the aftermath of his latest victory.

The American boxing star became a four-weight world champion last weekend as he beat Israil Madrimov in LA to take his WBA super-welterweight world title.

Prior to the bout, there was plenty of talk about a potential future match-up between Crawford and Mexico’s super-middleweight king Canelo Alvarez.

Saudi boxing chief HE Turki Alalshikh, who staged Crawford vs Madrimov, previously expressed his desire to make the Canelo fight, but has now U-turned on this.

This sparked a back-and-forth, which Crawford has reacted to.

Crawford told The Porter Way Podcast: “It’s crazy and it makes me laugh – all the antics Canelo is doing and saying in the media about the size and he won’t get no credit and all these type of things.

“But Canelo’s been fighting smaller guys his whole career.

“Canelo made his own catchweight for years.

“Canelo fought a smaller Floyd Mayweather, Canelo fought a smaller Amir Khan, he fought Jermell Charlo.

“And I’m pretty sure he didn’t make as much money with all those guys, except Mayweather – and even Edgar Berlanga right now – than he would with me.

“But yet he has all these excuses why he doesn’t wanna take a fight with me.

“If it’s all about business, then you’d be doing good business.

“I heard him say I’m easy work – if I was easy work then you would take all that money he’s offering you.

“But still he wants $200million for David Benavidez and he wants $150million to fight me.

“So that just lets me know right there that I’m a threat to him. I’m a threat to him and I’m a threat to his legacy.

“It would be crazy for a guy who started at 135lbs to come all the way up to 168lbs, no catchweight, and dethrone you.

“So he’s got that in the back of his head, ‘This guy is tough and he’s a boxer, he moves, he can punch, he can do it all. I can’t slip up and lose to this little guy. What would my fans think of me? What would my Mexican people think of me?’

“So it’s a big risk for him…

“But he wasn’t getting the amount of money thrown at him guaranteed to fight those other guys that he’s getting with me.

“So it just goes to show the level of respect that he gives me. I look at it as respect, I don’t look at it as disrespect.”

Another narrative Crawford is unhappy with came from Madrimov’s promoter Eddie Hearn after the fight.

Hearn represents Canelo’s next opponent Edgar Berlanga and also previously staged several of the Mexican’s bouts.

As such, he was in attendance for the first press conference for Canelo vs Berlanga on Monday and was captured having an interesting exchange.

Canelo said to Hearn: “You’ve been talking about me all f***ing week.”

To which Hearn replied: "We have to use your name to sell the [Crawford vs Madrimov] show."

Crawford has taken issue with this though, as he said: “I thought it was disrespectful for Eddie Hearn to lie and say, ‘We had to use your name to promote the fight.’

“We didn’t use Canelo’s name to promote s***.

“He’s trying to stay friends with him, but it’s disrespectful to me.

“We didn’t have to use Canelo’s name to promote nothing.

“Any time they gave me any question about Canelo I shut it down.

“So for him to say we had to use his name to sell the fight is disrespect.”