Terence Crawford Closely Outpoints Israil Madrimov: Should Crawford Vs Ennis Happen Next?

Terence Crawford earned a close unanimous decision victory over Israil Madrimov Saturday night at the BMO Stadium in Los Angeles, California to become the WBA junior middleweight champion at the 154 pound division and a 4 weight division champion for his career.

As impressive as that feat may sound, Crawford certainly did not have an easy road there, and infact had his hands full Saturday as Madrimov put up a great fight to many fans and critics, and had some even believing he did enough to win the fight.

“I think Israil Madrimov did enought to edge it tonight. I know there’s the thing of dethroning the champion. I don’t feel like Bud Crawford did that tonight” said Madrimov’s promoter Eddie Hearn at the post fight conference during a Q&A session.

He also stated in the ring after the fight “Everyone knows, his Excellency (Prince Turki Alalshikh of Saudì Arabia), they’re coming up to me saying, “You ruined our fight,” then you hear the scorecards and it’s a waste of time.”

Hearn was obviously disappointed in the outcome of the three judges’ scorecards at ringside of 116-112, 115-113 and 115-113.

Hearn felt Madrimov, as the champion coming in to Saturday night’s fight had done well enough in a lot of the close rounds between he and Crawford to edge them out and win unanimously instead of Crawford.

Madrimov obviously felt the same, adding “I fought the best pound for pound fighter in the world and I believe that I did enough because I’m the champion. I was defending the belt, I was controlling the rhythm, and I felt very comfortable inside the ring and I believe I did very well".”

Although Madrimov didn’t get the victory, he certainly displayed a great ability to box well against the champ. He also shwed his ability to take big shots time and time again from Crawford, while also delivering them back.

Crawford seemed to confirm that Madrimov was a tough boxer, saying “I got caught a couple times rushing in. Israil a real strong opponent. He only got 11 fights but he really strong. He can fight at 168, this guy is big. I ain’t going to lie, he strong.”

Crawford had no choice but to respect Madrimov and the performance he put up after the fight.

While it can be made that Israil put up a great performance to earn a victory, the same case can be made for Crawford as he put together great combinations all night, hitting Madrimov with timely punches to the head and body, while also using the ring masterfully to keep Madrimov at a distance he could never fully gain any great rhythm from.

Still, Crawford did not do as much as nearly expected by many, as lots of critics and fans predicted that he would stop Madrimov coming into Saturday night’s fight.

So what’s next? Does Crawford face Saùl Canelo Alvarez or does he fight Jaron “Boots” Ennis?

After Crawford's performance Saturday night, many critics believe the hype surrounding a Canelo vs Crawford fight are not the same as they were coming into the fight.

Many critics also feel that Crawford would be no match for Canelo after seeing how he had a difficult time handling Madrimov at 154, and see a jump to 168 to fight Canelo as being too great a risk for Bud.

Ennis, however, is coming off of a 5th round TKO victory against David Avanesyan in his hometown of Philadelphia, and was also met with some criticism of his performance as many critics believed he took too many hits against Avanesyan.

However, his boxing output and his ability to get the stoppage at the end of the 5th round was beautiful work.

Ennis called for the Crawford fight in his post fight press conference and said that he would like to collect the belts at 147 first, but would definitely be interested in fighting Crawford in the near future.

All boxing fans would love to see Crawford vs Ennis at 154 pounds or even at 147 pounds as well if Bud would be willing to go back down to that weight class.

For the time being, howver, he seems set to stay in the junior middleweight division and continue to collect belts there on his way to becoming a 3 time undisputed champion in 3 different weight classes.

If the money and terms were right in negotiations between Crawford’s and Ennis’ promotion teams, would you be interested in seeing that fight next?

Leave your thoughts and opinions in the comments section and check out the highlights from the Crawford vs Madrimov fight in the link below.