Terence Crawford doesn’t his opponent for the upcoming with David Avnesyan, taking place Dec. 10th in Omaha, Nebraska, available on BLK Prime PPV, as a tune-up fight.
“A lot of people don’t know him, but the boxing diehards [do] know him,” Crawford said on The DAZN Boxing Show. “They just act like they don’t because they’re kind of disappointed in the way negotiations went with me and Errol Spence, so of course they’re gonna try and throw shade on the fight. Like, ‘Oh he’s fighting this guy.’
In short, Crawford feels that he is fighting a dangerous and credible opponent, as Avanesyan, has had some big wins over the past couple of years.
The one glaring thing that people will point to is that Egidijus Kavaliauskas, better known as the “Mean Machine” knocked out Avanesyan, and then lost to Crawford shortly thereafter.
Crawford isn’t buying that take at all.
“…this guy that I’m fighting is a real guy. He’s a real challenge. He’s dangerous because he’s got everything to win — I mean, those guys right there that have nothing to lose are the most difficult guys to fight, with a lot of passion, a lot of determination, and a lot of will to win to dethrone you”
The truth is, a lot of the disappointment and frustration comes from fight fans who wanted Terence Crawford vs. Errol Spence Jr., and that fight is essentially done - at least for now, but probably forever. Put it in the list of good fights to never happen like Adonis Stevenson vs. Sergey Kovalev or Riddick Bowe vs. Lennox Lewis. The fight seems doomed, and the fans feel it, and are mad at Crawford, whether rightly or wrongly.
“I’m not listening to all these guys, ‘Oh, he’s fighting a bum, a cab driver, this and that,’ Crawford said. “Because they don’t know boxing. There’s a reason why a lot of people turned this guy down to fight him and why he hadn’t gotten his shot.”