What has Terence "Bud" Crawford achieved ahead of facing Canelo Alvarez?
By @codecamcode
What has Terence "Bud" Crawford achieved ahead of facing Canelo Alvarez?
Terence Crawford steps into the ring against Canelo with an unblemished record and a hall-of-fame resume. Here's a breakdown of Crawford's accomplishments and current status:
• Undefeated & Multiple Undisputed Titles: Crawford's pro record stands at 41-0 with 31 knockouts. He has never tasted defeat. Even more impressively, he is a rare two-division undisputed champion – he held all four belts at junior welterweight (140 lbs) in 2017, and then cleaned out welterweight (147 lbs) by defeating Errol Spence Jr. in July 2023. That Spence victory made him the first man in the four-belt era to become undisputed in two divisions.
• Multi-Weight Champion: "Bud" has now won titles in four weight classes: lightweight (135 lbs), junior welter (140), welter (147), and most recently a title at junior middleweight (154). In August 2024, he moved up and captured the WBA junior middleweight belt by defeating Israil Madrimov. He even grabbed an interim title at middleweight (160) on his journey, signaling his ambition to chase bigger fighters.
• Signature Wins: Crawford's resume includes dominant wins over top fighters: Yuriorkis Gamboa (in a firefight that put him on the map at 135), Viktor Postol (unifying at 140), Julius Indongo (to become undisputed at 140), Jeff Horn (to win a 147 title), Amir Khan, Kell Brook, Shawn Porter (TKO, being the first to stop Porter), and of course Errol Spence Jr. (a career-defining 9th-round TKO in their undisputed showdown). He has convincingly beaten every former champion or big name he's faced.
• Skills and Style: Crawford is often described as one of the most complete fighters of this era. He's a natural switch-hitter – starting fights orthodox, then often switching to southpaw where he's arguably even more lethal. He's a sharp tactical boxer with the ability to download opponents' strategies in the early rounds and then systematically break them down. Notably, Crawford has knockout power in both hands and has shown a mean, killer instinct once he has an opponent hurt. Defensively, he's slick with great reflexes, though he sometimes risks getting hit to deliver his own shots.
• Pound-for-Pound Ranking: After his one-sided win over Spence, many rank Crawford as the #1 pound-for-pound fighter in the world. At worst, he's top 3 on virtually every list. He's 37 years old (will be 38 by fight time), but his Spence performance showed he's as sharp as ever.
• Current Form: Crawford's last fight was in August 2024, meaning by the time he fights Canelo in Sept 2025, he'll have been out of the ring for about 13 months. In that last outing, he beat Madrimov for a 154-lb title, though reportedly it was a tough bout where Crawford had to adapt to the bigger man's strength. Some critics pointed out he looked more human there (one outlet even claimed it was a closer fight than the scores indicated), but Crawford still prevailed. Importantly, he's had no defeats or even knockdowns in recent memory.
Heading into the Canelo fight, Crawford is essentially challenging himself to the max: jumping to a third new weight class in two years. He's on a quest for greatness – already a surefire legend in lighter classes, now daring to topple a much heavier champion. If he manages to beat Canelo, it would rank among boxing's greatest triumphs by a smaller fighter moving up. Regardless, Crawford's achievements thus far – two-time undisputed, undefeated streak, multi-division titles – mean he has nothing left to prove… except perhaps this one huge challenge.
(Sources: Official bio notes on Crawford's record and titles; ESPN on Crawford's P4P status and last fights.)