Terence Crawford’s Insatiable Drive: Why He Must Win Against Canelo Alvarez

TERENCE CRAWFORD’S ENTIRE CAREER has been predicated on the need to prove his detractors wrong. Even today, as the former two-division undisputed champion prepares to move up two weight classes to challenge Canelo Alvarez for the super middleweight world championships, Crawford remains solely focused on victory.

For Crawford, winning is not confined to the boxing ring. His competitive spirit extends to table tennis, chess, video games, basketball, card games, debating, cooking, cleaning, and even who has the better music playlist. He is fundamentally driven by accomplishing feats that people deem impossible.

“It’s just something I was born with,” Crawford explained while training in Las Vegas. “I think that being undersized my entire life made me have to work harder than other people who were blessed with natural talent and size.”

“Losing is not an option. I have to win at all costs and no matter what.”

A Chase for Unprecedented History

Crawford plans to carve out history in his upcoming bout. While joining the club of two-division undisputed men’s champions (alongside Oleksandr Usyk and Naoya Inoue) was difficult enough, becoming the first male boxer to achieve undisputed status across three divisions has never been done (Claressa Shields accomplished this in women`s boxing). A victory would also make him only the second boxer in history to secure world titles at both lightweight and super middleweight.

Being told that a task is too great is the strongest propellant for Crawford’s ambition.

“Terence Crawford is the most competitive person I have ever met,” WBC lightweight champion Shakur Stevenson said. “Everything is a competition with him. He feels like he can beat you at anything and he truly believes everything he says. I don’t understand how a human can be that competitive. It has to be a gift from God.”

This “gift” is what Crawford carries into the ring against Canelo, and he fully expects to leave Allegiant Stadium with four new championship belts. When Crawford discusses a fight, he treats it not as a prediction, but as a spoiler.

“Canelo’s fans are going to be crying on Sunday morning when I take his belts,” Crawford stated.

The Reluctance to Share Control

Crawford admittedly obsesses over being the best at everything. He primarily avoids team sports because he is unwilling to let the outcome rely on someone else. This is precisely why he abandoned football for boxing as a teenager; if he has to depend on anyone else to determine victory, he is uninterested.

“When he has his mind set on something, he’s not going to lose,” welterweight Boubacar Sylla shared. “He just doesn’t lose at much of anything. I tell him he’s cheating sometimes, but it really boils down to putting the work in and being competitive.”

Sylla has trained with “Bud” since the 2016 unification fight against Viktor Postol and has witnessed Crawford’s pursuit of greatness firsthand.

“I’ve never seen that man outright lose at anything,” Sylla insisted. “He never gets dominated in sparring or anything he does. He’s absolutely relentless.”

Sylla and Stevenson detailed some of the outrageous challenges Crawford initiates.

“I just beat him at pingpong once,” Stevenson recalled. “But then he beat me three times after that. He’s a sore loser and he’ll make you play him 100 times until he wins. He won’t let you win at anything.”

Sylla offered an even stranger example: “He challenged me to a cook-off. Man, he challenged me to see who could sleep the longest one time. He won at that, too. He’ll challenge you to see who can walk the furthest. Anything you challenge him to, he’s going to find a way to win. I ain’t seen nobody like him.”

Manufacturing the Enemy

Shawn Porter, who fell victim to Crawford’s ruthless drive in 2021, knew Crawford since their amateur days. Porter noted that Crawford consciously isolated himself from other boxers, perhaps to heighten his competitive edge.

“Crawford was the only guy from Omaha on the amateur team, and he acted like he was the only guy from Omaha,” Porter said. “He was solo everywhere and always had a frown on his face. He already had a chip on his shoulder, and then he manufactured another one.”

Crawford missed out on the 2008 U.S. Olympic team but believed his style was better suited for the professional ranks. When he debuted in 2008, he lacked the fanfare of contemporaries like Adrien Broner, fueling his ambition further.

After he began winning world titles, Crawford started viewing everyone outside his inner circle of close friends and trainers as an enemy.

Porter learned this the hard way. Despite their prior friendship, Crawford created an atmosphere of abhorrence leading into their 2021 clash.

Crawford later admitted he never wanted to fight Porter out of respect, but that changed when he felt disrespected and used as a tool to gauge how a potential fight with Errol Spence might go.

“I felt disrespected because I knew that [Porter’s promoter] were just using me as a tool to gauge how a fight with Spence and me would go,” Crawford stated, his voice taking a serious tone. “It was clear as day, but he insisted on fighting me. So I said, ‘OK, let’s do it.’ And you saw what happened.”

Crawford knocked Porter out and sent him into retirement.

As Crawford rose in the pound-for-pound rankings, his “me against the world” narrative only strengthened. “It’s like the more the world tried to accept him, the more he wanted this narrative to exist,” Porter observed. “He needs it. Once he has a chip on his shoulder, there is literally nothing you can do to get it off of him.”

The New Mount Everest

After running roughshod over Spence in 2023, Crawford needed a new challenge—one far beyond the remaining welterweight division. He needed a Mount Everest.

Initially, a move to 154 pounds to challenge Jermell Charlo seemed plausible, but once Charlo lost to Canelo, that fight lost its appeal. After just one fight at 154 pounds (a decision victory over Israil Madrimov), Crawford set his sights on Canelo at 168 pounds.

“I didn’t look much into it because of the weight difference,” Crawford said. “But once I started looking closer at him, I realized he wasn’t as big as everyone says he is.”

When Canelo dismissed Crawford as an option due to his size, Crawford pushed harder, using the undisputed champion’s doubt as fuel. His unrelenting thirst for competition was fully activated once again.

“Most of us have an on and off switch, and if you stay on too long, you burn yourself out,” Porter noted. “Bud doesn’t have an off switch. It’s incredible to see how he manages to stay turned on without needing a break.”

Beyond his competitive drive, Crawford is also meticulously prepared. He doesn`t rely solely on his athleticism but uses his boxing IQ and switch-hitting ability to control every exchange.

Ray Beltran, one of only three opponents since 2014 to go the distance with Crawford, stated: “He’s a special fighter, but you don’t realize it until you are in the ring with him. He controls every aspect of the fight and is always one step ahead of you. He’s the closest thing to [Floyd] Mayweather that I have seen but he is a lot more dangerous.”

Beltran believes Crawford’s hunger and boxing IQ will secure the upset victory against Canelo.

“Crawford isn’t going to come into the ring like a challenger because he fights like a hungry champion who is after legacy, not money,” Beltran said. “Canelo doesn’t fight with that same hunger anymore. He may have fought bigger and stronger fighters but nobody with the skill, talent and hunger that Crawford has.”

Heading into the fight, Crawford believes the deck is stacked against him. He expects to be in enemy territory at Allegiant Stadium, fighting on Mexican Independence Day weekend, and he embraces the role of the underdog.

“I have his people going against me and my own people going against me,” Crawford concluded. “Some people just don’t want to see you rise and pray for your downfall. That’s what fuels me. I have supporters but I just hear the haters more.”

Canelo routinely downplayed Crawford as a “great” fighter who has yet to face an “elite” opponent—identifying himself, of course, as elite. That was all Crawford needed to confirm his new enemy.

Now, Crawford has a point to prove, and he knows exactly why he will win:

“Canelo lost before, so he understands how to lose. I don’t.”

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