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By: Hans Themistode
No matter how many times his eye-catching knockouts are replayed on various television channels and regardless of how spotless his undefeated record is, fans of Terence Crawford simply want more.
The current WBO welterweight champion has long expressed a desire to face the top names in his division. But, no matter how loud he bellyaches, Crawford has yet to face an elite 147 pounder.
At the age of 33, Crawford (37-0, 28 KOs) has no intentions of hanging up his gloves anytime soon. However, if the Omaha, Nebraska native did in fact call it a career, he would be perfectly fine with the way things ultimately played out.
“I feel like I did everything that I dreamed of,” said Crawford during an interview with Teddy Atlas. “My ultimate dream was to become a champion. I did that in 2014 against Ricky Burns.”
Since winning that aforementioned world title against Burns nearly a decade ago, Crawford has gone on to dominate his competition at 135, 140, and now, 147 pounds. The more he subsequently climbed up in weight, the better he performed and as a result, a proliferation of world titles soon followed. Yet, even while Crawford’s abilities afforded him fame and adulation, he believes that his sublime skills ultimately did him a disservice.
“I had put extra dreams on top of dreams, on top of dreams. After conquering goal, after goal, after goal, it felt like I was stagnant and shelved from fighting these other top fighters because I was such a threat.”
For most of his career, Crawford has been promoted by Top Rank and promoter Bob Arum. His stiffest competition, at least at 147 pounds, resided with Premier Boxing Champions (PBC). Up until recently, before Crawford was mandated to take on Shawn Porter, a perennial contender in the welterweight division who is signed with PBC, the pound-for-pound star grew frustrated with his lack of big-name options.
More times than not, the term, “on the wrong side of the street” was used as an explanation as to why Crawford was unable to land career-defining fights. In a moment of pure candor, Crawford opened up on how he believes 147 pounders associated with PBC, used that term to avoid him.
“What they did was, they going to just wait me out. I never heard somebody say he’s on the wrong side of the street until it came to Terence Crawford.”
Although Crawford is firmly of the belief that the entire 147 pound stable of Premier Boxing Champions has done their best to eschew him, he’s perfectly content with his long list of accomplishments. That said, Crawford does acknowledge that he has one career box that is still unchecked.
“If I was to retire tomorrow, I’ll be happy with my career because I’ve done a lot in the sport of boxing. I did everything that I set my sights on except becoming undisputed at the welterweight division.”
