By Norm Frauenheim-
It’s been a summer about comebacks, which is another way of saying that it’s been mostly forgettable.
Maybe, the Oleksandr Usyk-Anthony Joshua rematch on Aug. 20 knocks out the doldrums. Maybe, it ends with something memorable in the Canelo Alvarez-Gennadiy Golovkin trilogy on Sept. 17.
For now, at least, the season belongs to a power hitter in another arena. Yankee outfielder Aaron Judge’s bat is the only Big Drama Show.
As Judge moves ever closer to Roger Maris’ magical 61 homerun mark, boxing finds itself stuck in the waiting room. Plenty appears to be on deck, but in the here-and-now there’s only Terence Crawford-Errol Spence Jr.
ESPN reported in June that an agreement was close. Maybe it is. Maybe, Crawford and Spence are signing the contract as I write this. Maybe, it gets announced this weekend. Maybe, maybe.
The sooner, the better, because the messy web of maybes has put the balkanized business and its suspicious fans on edge. When ESPN first reported that a deal was close, talk was that the long-awaited welterweight fight would happen in October. Now, no news has pushed the speculated bout into November. Can the Twelfth-Of-Never be too far away?
It’s getting hard to remember when Crawford-Spence wasn’t a topic. It’s been in the public imagination for so long that the two welterweights have gone from early prime time into their 30s.
A whole new 147-pound generation is beginning to emerge. One of them, Vergil Ortiz Jr., will be back in the ring Saturday in his first fight in a year. Ortiz (18-0, 18 KOs), of Grand Prairie TX, is coming off a scary illness for a date against UK welterweight Michael McKinson (22-0, 2 KOs) in Fort Worth Saturday night on DAZN.
“Fortunately, time is on my side,’’ said Ortiz, who suffered from a debilitating condition apparently brought on by intense workouts. “I’m only 24 years old, and at the same time, I don’t want to be wasting time. You know what that’s like. I should have fought three or four times already, and that’s time we won’t get back.’’
Time is what Crawford and Spence are running out of. Crawford is 34; Spence is 32. It’s no coincidence that one of the acronyms made the Ortiz-McKinson a title eliminator this week. Increasingly-impatient fans will watch in part to get an idea at how Ortiz might do against a Crawford or Spence.
Reasons are countless as to why there was still no Crawford-Spence deal as of Thursday. PIck one, pick-em all.
Crawford, at least, seemed confident this week that the fight will happen.
“Hopefully we can get that fight made down the line,” Crawford told FightHub on Wednesday. “Real soon, not down the line, and give fans what they’ve been looking for.
“We’re working to get it done for you all.’’
The apparent hurdle – surprise, surprise — is the size of the prize in this projected prizefight. In a welterweight bout some say could be the best since Sugar Ray Leonard-Thomas Hearns, both Crawford and Spence want big money in what would be pay-per-view. They’re hoping for big guarantees. However, most of their money would likely have to come from a percentage of pay-per-view sales.
That’s the problem. Neither Crawford nor Spence have done big PPV numbers. Crawford’s impressive stoppage of Shawn Porter last November generated fewer than 100,000 PPV buys, according multiple reports.
That makes promoters and networks leery, especially during an era when theft of the PPV signal is rampant. It also leaves a question about whether there’s a sugar-daddy willing to step up with the kind of investment that can make it happen.
That’s exactly what transpired in 2015 when then-CBS President Les Moonves stepped up and brokered the deal that led to the revenue record-setting fight between Floyd Mayweather and Manny Pacquiao.
Can it happen again? No sign of it in July. But, maybe, there will be a home-run deal in August. At least, Aaron Judge is there and on a pace to prove that just about anything is possible.