Terence Crawford, the WBO welterweight champion, has waited years to fight a prominent name in the category. His chance arrives on Saturday night, when he enters the ring against two-time former welterweight champion Shawn Porter in a major pay-per-view event.
Fighting as part of the Top Rank stable, he was barred from fighting the biggest welterweight stars, all of whom compete under the Premier Boxing Champions banner. Nonetheless, Crawford’s abilities were on full show as he successfully defended his championship four times, all via slam dunk.
Porter, a PBC boxer, was ultimately given the opportunity to meet Crawford after the WBO appointed him a mandatory challenger. Porter won his first welterweight belt in December 2013, by decision against Devon Alexander. Two fights later, he was defeated by Kell Brook in a split decision. Porter also lost his second championship defence, losing a hard-fought, tight decision against Keith Thurman in June 2016.
Terence Crawford and Shawn Porter will clash in the main event of tonight’s ESPN+ pay-per-view, with Crawford trying to establish himself once and for all in the biggest fight of his career and Porter looking to stop a top welterweight star for the third time.
We’ll be there from the early fights all the way through the big event, with Wil Esco calling the rounds for the four pay-per-view fights.
The whole schedule of live fights for this evening, as well as information on how to watch them:
Early Preliminaries (ESPN App, 6:00 pm ET)
Junior lightweights Karlos Balderas (10-1, 9 KO) vs Julio Cortez (15-3, 11 KO), 6 rounds
Tiger Johnson (debut) vs. Antonius Grable (3-1-1, 3 KO), 4 rounds, welterweights
Preliminary round (ESPN+ and ESPN2, 7:00 p.m. ET)
Preliminary round (ESPN+ and ESPN2, 7:00 p.m. ET)
Featherweights Isaac Dogboe (22-2, 15 KO) vs Christopher Diaz (26-3, 16 KO), 10 rounds
Rematch, featherweights, 8 rounds, Adam Lopez (15-3, 6 KO) against Adan Ochoa (12-2, 5 KO).
Main Event (ESPN+ PPV, 9:30 p.m. ET)
Terence Crawford (37-0, 28 KO) vs Shawn Porter (31-3-1, 17 KO), 12 rounds (Crawford -700, Porter +500), for Crawford’s WBO championship (Crawford -700, Porter +500).
Patrice Volny (16-0, 10 KO) vs Esquiva Falcao (28-0, 20 KO), 12 rounds, IBF eliminator (Falcao -700, Volny +500).
Middleweights Hassan N’Dam (38-5, 21 KO) vs. Janibek Alimkhanuly (10-0, 6 KO), 10 rounds (Alimkhanuly -3000, N’Dam +1100).
Raymond Muratalla (12-0, 10 KO) vs. Elias Araujo (21-3, 8 KO)
Lightweights Elias Araujo (21-3, 8 KO) vs. Raymond Muratalla (12-0, 10 KO), 8 rounds (Muratalla -2000, Araujo +1000).
