Boxing Challenge

  A soft weekend in boxing as far as depth is salvaged by an appearance by arguably the best fighter in the world on somewhat free ( you do pay for cable after all) television from ESPN and Top Rank.

Terence Crawford defends his WBO welterweight title against former IBF champion Kell Brook in a heavily anticipated fight- If this was 2016.

At that time, Brook was possibly the best welterweight in the world, having a decisive win over Shawn Porter ( that holds to this day, as Brook's win was far more authoritative than later wins by Keith Thurman and Errol Spence) and few wanted to face Brook.

That was before his gutsy, but questionable decision to face middleweight champion Gennady Golovkin, in which he was stopped and suffered a broken orbital bone, and a title defense against Errol Spence that saw him fight well and take a lead before another broken orbital bone and stoppage loss. Since losing to Spence, Brook has won three in a row at junior middleweight against weaker competition and hasn't looked good doing it.

Combine all of that for Brook along with fighting at a weight that he hasn't seen in years with the skills of Crawford and this looks like an easy fight to call.

I can see Brook winning some rounds early as Crawford doesn't always start fast, but Crawford should break him down and finish him in the middle to late rounds.

The co-feature is a junior bantamweight rematch from an ESPN bubble fight earlier this fight with Joshua Franco battling Andrew Moloney for a minor title.

Franco surprised Moloney (and Top Rank) in winning a unanimous decision that Franco won (on two cards) only because of an eleventh round knockdown, but deserved to be far wider in my opinion.

Moloney was in deep trouble in the eleventh and had the fight been ended in the round, I don't think many would have objected, but Moloney finished as well as he could for a fighter with two busted eardrums and Moloney exercised his rematch clause immediately after.

In the boxing challenge, I lead Ramon Malpica 156-147

WBO Welterweight Title. 12 Rds

Terence Crawford vs Kell Brook

R.L:  Crawford Unanimous Decision
TRS: Crawford KO 9

Junior Bantamweights. 12 Rds

Joshua Franco vs Andrew Moloney

Both: Franco Unanimous Decision