{"id":317798,"date":"2026-04-13T03:57:50","date_gmt":"2026-04-12T22:27:50","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/ebiztoday.news\/?p=317798"},"modified":"2026-04-13T03:57:51","modified_gmt":"2026-04-12T22:27:51","slug":"crawford-knew-he-would-beat-canelo-after-berlanga","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ebiztoday.news\/index.php\/2026\/04\/13\/crawford-knew-he-would-beat-canelo-after-berlanga\/","title":{"rendered":"Crawford Knew He Would Beat Canelo After Berlanga"},"content":{"rendered":"

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Crawford pointed to Canelo Alvarez vs Edgar Berlanga because the moment he made that decision.<\/p>\n

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\u201cOnce I was at 147, I used to be already calling out Canelo. I used to be already saying I\u2019ll move up three weight classes and fight Canelo,\u201d Crawford said to Jai McAllister. \u201cMe and Turki went to observe him fight Berlanga, and I said, \u2018He can\u2019t beat me.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

Berlanga entered as a heavy underdog and lacked the movement or output often needed to hassle Canelo. Even so, Canelo couldn’t break him down quickly, working in brief bursts relatively than sustained pressure.<\/p>\n

Crawford treated that as an indication of something deeper. From 2021 to 2025, Canelo Alvarez held all 4 titles at 168 but was not consistently facing probably the most dangerous threats within the division.<\/p>\n

Younger fighters comparable to Osleys Iglesias, Christian Mbilli, and Diego Pacheco represented a distinct variety of challenge, built on volume, physicality, and pace.<\/p>\n

As an alternative, Canelo\u2019s run included an older Gennadiy Golovkin, John Ryder, and Berlanga, opponents who didn’t force him into prolonged exchanges or test his ability to cope with sustained movement.<\/p>\n

Crawford made a call that those habits would carry into their fight. Once they met in September 2025, he controlled distance, stepped around exchanges, and prevented Canelo from setting his feet.<\/p>\n

Canelo was reduced to single shots, while Crawford dictated the pace across long stretches, resulting in a unanimous decision win and all 4 super middleweight titles changing hands.<\/p>\n

Crawford did not only imagine he could win. He read a pattern, trusted it will hold, and proved it against a distinct level of opponent.<\/p>\n

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Dan Ambrose is a boxing journalist at Boxing News 24, recognized for his direct evaluation and extensive coverage of the worldwide fight landscape. His reporting focuses on major bouts, divisional developments, and the game\u2019s most discussed storylines.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div><\/div>\n

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Crawford pointed to Canelo Alvarez vs Edgar Berlanga because the moment he made that decision. \u201cOnce I was at 147, I used to be already calling out Canelo. I used to be already saying I\u2019ll move up three weight classes and fight Canelo,\u201d Crawford said to Jai McAllister. \u201cMe and Turki went to observe him […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":317799,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[338],"tags":[1125,12066,7974,10113,4364],"class_list":["post-317798","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-sports","tag-beat","tag-berlanga","tag-canelo","tag-crawford","tag-knew"],"aioseo_notices":[{"message":"The permalink for this post just changed! This could result in 404 errors for your site visitors.","status":"warning","options":{"id":"0a2ae5f84bc2c0423042ed7ec22d2e40","isDismissible":true,"actions":[{"url":"https:\/\/ebiztoday.news\/wp-admin\/admin.php?page=aioseo-redirects","label":"Add Redirect to improve SEO","class":"aioseo-redirects-slug-changed"}]},"allowedContexts":["posts"]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ebiztoday.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/317798","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ebiztoday.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ebiztoday.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ebiztoday.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ebiztoday.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=317798"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/ebiztoday.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/317798\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":317801,"href":"https:\/\/ebiztoday.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/317798\/revisions\/317801"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ebiztoday.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/317799"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ebiztoday.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=317798"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ebiztoday.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=317798"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ebiztoday.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=317798"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}