Terence Crawford has inherited Errol Spence Jr’s IBF welterweight mandatory challenger Jaron ‘Boots’ Ennis and will need to fight him soon if he plans on keeping the title.
The hardcore boxing public would like to see Crawford face Boots Ennis because this is a guy with a lot of talent who is being pegged as the fighter that will carry the welterweight division in the future.
It would be a difficult fight for Crawford and not one that would pay the kind of money he got for his contest against Spence last Saturday night.
Ennis (31-0, 28 KOs) lacks the experience to fight some on the level of Crawford, but he has no other choice but to take the match if he can get it.
With Crawford potentially moving up to 154 soon and getting older, Boots Ennis can’t afford to wait two to five years to get more experience.
Crawford might retire by the time Boots has the experience required to have a shot at winning.
Spence (28-1, 22 KOs) lost to Crawford by a ninth round technical knockout last Saturday night but said that he wants to run it back in December at 154. If Crawford goes along with that idea, he won’t be free to defend against Boots Ennis.
Crawford (40-0, 31 KOs) could also vacate his four 147-lb titles to go up to 154 to begin campaigning in that weight class, looking to become a three-division undisputed champ.
Spence should have been pulled out in seventh
“The corner was confused, and if the corner was not confused, the fighter was confused,” said Shawn Porter on his podcast, talking about Errol Spence Jr’s problems last Saturday night against Terence Crawford.
“I could see that wasn’t going to turn around [in the later rounds]. Errol Spence can thump, but sometimes you have to look after your health, sometimes you have to look after the health of your career, and you have to look at your future.
“I just don’t think that the nine rounds that they ended up going, I thought it should have been seven. That was it. Harvey Dock is a great ref.
“Terence was extremely strategic in the first round. You don’t see him exchanging a lot. He didn’t let go of that right hand at all in the first round.
“In the first or second round, Terence muscled Spence on the inside. It was like, ‘If I can muscle you, I can beat you.’
“What I was saying is that Errol is more fundamentally sound, and doesn’t make as many mistakes, but it almost even didn’t matter because Terence was so fast & so sharp,” said Carson Mertz.
“What could he do? Crawford was firing, and there was nothing he could do. Bud said after that when he got caught with the flush shot [from Spence]. It was like, ‘That’s it? That’s the power you have? It’s going to be a long night for you, buddy.'”
