Does Crawford Risk Legacy For Canelo Payday? Murtazaliev, Bohachuk Options

Canelo Alvarez’s decision to begin negotiations with William Scull on January 10 for a possible fight in May puts Terence Crawford in an uncertain position.

Four-division world champion Crawford was hoping to be the next super middleweight champion Canelo (62-2-2, 39 KOs), but it looks like he won’t get that big money fight.

Crawford’s Choices

Terence, 37, will now have to start thinking about fighting someone else to keep him busy while he waits. He hopes Canelo will give him a payday in September. I don’t know if he will, but you can understand why Crawford doesn’t believe it will.

If Crawford does not retire, these would be his best options for estate and financial purposes:

– Sebastian Fundora
– Jaron ‘Boots’ Ennis
– Tim Tszyu
– Serhii Bohachuk
– Bakhram Murtazaliev

Fundora will be busy with his expected title defense against Errol Spence and will probably not be available until the second half of 2025. So, if Crawford wants to fight him, he’ll have to stay on the shelf a little longer.

He has already been out of action since his tough win over Israel Madrimov on August 3. We’re probably looking at Crawford being out of the ring for a year and a half if he chooses to wait for the Fundora match. That’s not the smartest thing for Crawford to do, but if he’s not willing to risk getting beaten by Murtazaliev, Bohachuk, Tszyu, or Ennis, it’s understandable why he’s choosing to wait.

Most of those fights would require Turki Al-Shiekh to finance himself so Crawford (41-0, 31 KOs) would be willing to take on any of those guys. He’s not a PPV guy for one of the promoters to be willing to give him a guaranteed big purse and hope the match sells out.

As we saw in Terence’s last event against Israel Madrimov, he is not a PPV attraction. That’s why Turki needs to be involved so that Crawford can fight any dangerous fighters at 154, like Murtazaliev or Bohachuk. Those would have been tough fights for Crawford even when he was younger, but now that he’s pushing 40, those fighters would be nightmares for him.

Undoubtedly At 154?

If only Crawford had the couragewill face IBF 154-lb champion Murtazaliev (23-0, 17 KOs) in a unification bout to put himself in a position to face Fundora in an uncontested rematch in 2025.

If Terence can hold the IBF belt, he can pressure Fundora to fight him. Becoming the undisputed junior middleweight champion will raise Crawford’s stock in the boxing world, which could help him get a Canelo fight.

It wouldn’t be expected that Bud would get the fight because, as we’ve seen before, Canelo can’t be pressured in fights. He can ignore Crawford his entire career, like he did with David Benavidez, and he won’t lose sleep over the criticism he receives from fans.