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Pound for pound update January 2020: a new name at the top

By Matthew Saljanin

Saul 'Canelo' Alvarez (C), WBA Super title holder, celebrates winning his WBO light heavyweight title bout. (Photo by Valery SharifulinTASS via Getty Images)
Saul 'Canelo' Alvarez (C), WBA Super title holder, celebrates winning his WBO light heavyweight title bout. (Photo by Valery SharifulinTASS via Getty Images) /
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Photo by Al Bello/Getty Images
Photo by Al Bello/Getty Images /

4. Terrence Crawford

Record: 36-0, 27 KOs

Previous Ranking: 2

This ranking pains me. For my money, Crawford is the best fighter in the world, and if there were a tournament where everyone was the same weight and all fought each other, Crawford would my choice as the favorite to win it all. He is that good, a special talent who could eventually be considered an all time great.

So why is he No. 4 on this list? His resume simply does not stack up to those ahead of him. Truthfully, Usyk has a better resume than him as well, but Crawford’s “eye test” keeps him ahead in the rankings for now.

It’s not entirely his fault, but his run at welterweight has been uninspiring. Most of the talent at 147 is aligned with PBC and Al Haymon, while Crawford is with Bob Arum and Top Rank. The two sides can do business when the money is right (see: Wilder-Fury), but the key is the money being right.

His resume certainly isn’t bad, but it is not fantastic. He was champion at lightweight, the undisputed Jr. welterweight champion, and now is a champion at welterweight. He has quality wins over Ricky Burns, Yuriorkis Gamboa, Ray Beltran Viktor Postol and Julius Indongo. Pretty solid.

However, his run at welterweight has not been anything special. Since moving up to 147 pounds, he has wins over Jeff Horn, Jose Benavidez Jr., Amir Khan and Egidijus Kavaliauskas. Again, certainly not bad, but that is far from excellent.

In his last fight against Kavaliauskas, Crawford arguably looked the worst he has as a pro. He got caught with a lot of clean punches and even got dropped (despite the ref not ruling it a knockdown). He was never in real danger, and still ended the fight via knockout, but he did not look like his typical superhuman self.

If any other fighter defeated Kavaliauskas in that manor, it would have been a very impressive win, but for Crawford it was considered one of his worst performances.

Fair or not, Crawford is held to a higher standard than most fighters because of how talented he is, so him losing a few rounds is pretty shocking to most fans, even if it was to a good fighter.

Hopefully there is enough fan demand to get the Crawford-Spence fight done, as that is the best fight to make in boxing, and it isn’t close.

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