Canelo Alvarez vs Terence Crawford: Can American withstand foe's power at super middleweight?

A few days ago, Terence Crawford turned heads on Instagram by posting a picture of himself flexing his chiseled physique ahead of his mega fight against Canelo Alvarez.

A burning question entering Saturday night’s showdown between the boxing superstars is can Crawford withstand the undisputed super middleweight world champion’s power at 168 pounds?

We’d like to give Crawford the nod of yes, he will be able to take Alvarez’ power shots.

After moving up from being the undisputed ruler at welterweight to defeat Israil Madrimov and become a 154-pound world champion last August, Crawford had essentially a year to properly build muscle toward trying to become the only male boxer to reign undisputed at three different weight classes in the modern era. (Claressa Shields has already accomplished this feat in women's boxing).

The key here is properly building muscle as ‘Bud’ did not opt to blow up and cut weight closer to the fight. Instead, he has meticulously added muscle to his frame in gradually growing into this two additional division ascension.

Conversely, Amir Khan had roughly a year to build himself up two divisions from welterweight to middleweight and was blasted by a vicious sixth-round knockout at the hands of Alvarez back in May 2016.

While Canelo has not recorded a knockout since stopping Caleb Plant in the 11^th round of their November 2021 bout, he has flashed that power in knocking down four of his next six opponents including John Ryder, Jermell Charlo, Jaime Munguia and Edgar Berlanga — all fighters who the Mexican sensation defeated via unanimous decision.

“He’s not as fast as Crawford but then again he hits a lot harder than Crawford,” Khan told Shawn Porter about Alvarez on The PorterWay Podcast last month. “He has that devastating power that can literally knock anyone out.”

Then again, Khan, who has also shared the ring with Crawford via a sixth-round TKO loss in April 2019, also believes ‘Bud’ owns the great equalizer to combat Canelo’s power.

“Crawford doesn’t have as much power as Canelo, but he has that ring IQ,” Khan offered. “If you’ve got that sharpness and timing and ring IQ, I think power doesn’t really matter because you’re going to make the fighter miss and you’re going to confuse him and really have him on his back foot.”

While boxing fans and critics alike will only truly find out whether Crawford can withstand Alvarez’ power when the bell rings Saturday night, his current physique, the sparring necessary to get here and his ring savvy all point to ‘Bud’ being up to the task.

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