By Bill Green
In a few days Terence Crawford will challenge Jeff Horn for the WBO welterweight title at the MGM Grand Garden Arena and streamed Live by ESPN+. The stage is set, the hype is growing, but several questions for both fighters need to answered inside that ring on fight night. For the champion, its an all to redundant one, did he beat a slipping past his prime champion in Manny Pacquiao, or is he simply vastly underrated?
For Crawford, he too is growing tiresome of the same repetitive questions, how will he handle a new division? Can he handle a full fledged welterweight power? Crawford himself, has chosen to ignore the majority of the critics and simply put quality work the only way he knows how…in the gym.
Horn and his team all week long have been on the defense and voiced their displeasure regarding how they have felt slighted on this promotion. In other words, they have a major chip on their shoulder and are definitely highly motivated to prove the critics wrong.
Fresh off 8-10 rounds of sparring last week, Fightnews.com® was able to sit down with the formerly undisputed 140lb champ and several key members of his team.
I have heard from others inside your camp, that this is the strongest and freshest they have seen you to date. Why do you believe they feel this way and do you feel the same?
Camp was great, but for me, I mean we always put work in, it’s what is necessary to be at this level. My team’s job is to prepare me and my job is to listen and put that work in…we both feel like that was accomplished in this camp.
This question is for Jaimie Belt, (Strength and Conditioning coach for Crawford) Can you break it down a bit more systematic as why you believe this camp was indeed special?
Belt: First of all, I agree with Bud, he works hard regardless if the opponent is Jeff Horn or Mickey Mouse, that’s just who he is and what makes him special. The motivation is always there. I can tell you this, with the reschedule of the fight, this is the longest training camp of his career. Easily 8-10 weeks. The biggest factor the world is going to see is how strong he is at this weight. Bud is no longer taxing his body to cut weight. He has easily put on 10lbs of muscle all the while by maintaining speed and athleticism. When you are constantly running and doing things to cut weight, your knees and joints suffer…we didn’t have those problems this camp.
Champ, I know this is a touchy question and also a tiresome one, but how is the hand feeling, any concern whatsoever?
NO, none at all. I said during the reschedule that I would be fine in a few weeks and I was. I listened to what the doc recommended and its a non factor. I will say this, even though, I couldn’t do certain things with the hand, I stayed in the gym.
BoMac, this one is for you. There has been a lot of trash talking, not so much with the fighters, but mostly among you and Horn’s handlers. Do you care to comment?
BoMac: Look we try to keep things civil and professional. Honestly we respect Jeff Horn and his accomplishments…hell no matter what anyone says his hand was raised against Pacquiao. But, when all that I read and hear is how you are going to do this or that against my fighter, a young man that I have been around since he was 8 years old than ummm #uck ya I’m gonna tell them how it is.
For those curious and to keep the hype train going, what do you mean how it is??
BoMac: They know what time it is and they know what’s coming. They shouldn’t have made this shit personal, they angered the beast and now they have to deal with Terence and that is all on them. I’m done talking about it too!!!
Terence recently you told me that you felt like Horn is in fact underrated and that you could see how the judges awarded him the title against Pacquiao. What things do you feel that he is simply not given credit for?
Ya, it was a close fight, like I said it could have went either way. All that talk of Manny took him lightly, that doesn’t matter, that’s not Horn’s fault he did what he was supposed to do and take advantage of the situation. He has a decent but heavy jab, he’s determined and gets you to fight his fight, in shape and he believes in his abilities.
Jaimie, you mentioned to me in our discussion, that based on everything you studied and see on video that you don’t believe that their in fact is a size difference. Can you elaborate?
Belt: Well for starters I haven’t met him in person but most sites list him at 5’9 with a 68 inch reach. Ya, he campaigns at 147 and this is our first fight. But my opinion is Terence has already faced bigger fighters that most likely rehydrated to more than what I believe Horn will on fight night too. Molina was an easy 165 and it’s not like we don’t spar against bigger fighters, hell we have to or Bud would run through sparring in a week. So I guess if you think that with Bud being 5’8 with a 70” reach is significant smaller than its whatever. I know for a fact that Horn isn’t as strong as Bud and if his team doesn’t believe than they will come fight night.
BoMac, both Red Spikes and Esau Dieguez stated that they believe the size factor is irrelevant. Red went on to tell me what he always tell me “Bill you know there is levels to this sport and Bud is going to prove that again and again” My Question to you is ‘As his manager, do you take the risk and trade with him or play it safe and not even find out if he can handle a so called full fledged welterweight?’
BoMac: Listen, last time I checked, Manny had him wobbly bad in the 9th and he hasn’t hurt anybody for years. Now, I’m not saying he don’t have a chin so don’t be going saying Bo said that. lol What I’m saying is Bud isn’t just touching people and getting on his bike, he is dropping them and punishing them, some of those guys were never the same. I personally believe he ruins guys. Look what happened to Gamboa and Indongo in their next fights. We are going to execute the game plan, bottom line Bud can do a little of everything, we have plan A, B, C and even Z ready.
Bud, how do you personally feel at this weight, I know a couple years ago you told me that you believed you will move to 147 when the time is right. Why do you believe the time is right?
I fought basically my whole life as an amateur at 132, than as pro at 135 which I was able to do but we felt was costly to my body. I unified the belts at 140 and 147 is where all the action is at. All the big fights are at 147. They say I can’t do it and they said that every step of the way and here I am.
So, I hate to ask. Is there any concern about Jeff Horn and the fact that he has campaigned as high as 151 lbs before?
No, I don’t care about all that, that stuff to me isn’t what counts. When this fight is over, hopefully you all give credit. This fight has nothing to do with size but everything to do with skills. I believe that mine are better and so does he…that’s why we are going to fight and that’s why you all should grab a ticket or catch it on ESPN+.