Who is the best pound-for-pound fighter in the world today? Roman Gonzalez and Gennady Golovkin, for many people two of the best on the planet today, are both in action tomorrow night, while Vasyl Lomachenko, the P-4-P pick of many fans, returns to action in April. But if it’s not one of these three great fighters you have as your No.1 P-4-P, then maybe it’s Terence Crawford.
The undefeated super-lightweight champ who also reigned as a world champ at lightweight, will return on May 20 in Newark, New Jersey and according to his promoter Bob Arum, Crawford will face either Adrian Granados or Felix Diaz. Arum spoke with RingTV.com yesterday:
“I think we pretty well came to terms with Crawford and we’re looking to close an opponent but it will be a good opponent,” Arum told Ring. “Amir Imam is promoted by [Don] King and nobody can get hold of him. It’s a problem. So it’s really now between two of them, Granados and Felix Diaz.”
Interestingly, the King promoted Imam was upset and stopped by Granados around a year and-a-half ago, Granados bursting the bubble of “the next big thing.” But then, in his last fight, Granados was beaten by Adrien Broner who decisioned him. Diaz of The Dominican Republic, also lost a fight in 2015, when he was closely, controversially outpointed by Lamont Peterson. Southpaw Diaz, 19-1(9) is coming off a July 2016 win over an unbeaten Sammy Vasquez and he followed that up with a stay-busy win over Levis Morales in December.
In truth, Crawford will be a hefty favourite to beat either Diaz or Granados, as he would be the firm favourite if he wound up getting Imam in the ring instead. As special as he and his talents are, Crawford should really be getting the big, big fights at this stage of his dominant career.
Still, at least the 30-0(21) star is keeping active, with three bouts fought last year and hopefully Crawford having the same amount of action again this year.