{"id":388816,"date":"2025-09-01T07:50:20","date_gmt":"2025-09-01T07:50:20","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/388816\/"},"modified":"2025-09-01T07:50:20","modified_gmt":"2025-09-01T07:50:20","slug":"vacate-before-jaron-ennis-becomes-mandatory","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/388816\/","title":{"rendered":"Vacate Before Jaron Ennis Becomes Mandatory"},"content":{"rendered":"

Eddie Hearn has a lot of respect for Terence Crawford<\/a> and everything the four-weight world champion has accomplished.
The British promoter also has some advice for one of the best boxers of this generation. Hearn encouraged Crawford to relinquish the WBA 154-pound title before Jaron Ennis<\/a> encounters Uisma Lima<\/a> in a WBA elimination match Oct. 11 at Wells Fargo Center in Philadelphia.
Ennis (34-0, 31 KOs, 1 NC) would become the WBA\u2019s mandatory challenger in his new division if the heavily favored former welterweight champion beats Angola\u2019s Lima (14-1, 10 KOs). The Philadelphia native would then call Crawford out louder than ever \u2013 win, lose or draw in Crawford\u2019s showdown with Canelo Alvarez<\/a> on Sept. 13 at Allegiant Stadium in Las Vegas.
\u201c[Ennis is] fighting a final eliminator for the WBA title, which puts us as mandatory to Terence Crawford,\u201d Hearn told The Ring<\/a>. “Now, obviously, he may never fight again at \u201954, but he has not vacated his title yet.<\/p>\n

“If I\u2019m Terence Crawford, I\u2019m vacating now. Because when we become mandatory, we\u2019re calling that fight on, and then he\u2019s gonna have to vacate the belt once Boots is mandatory. That\u2019s not a great look.\u201d<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

Ennis chased the Crawford fight for a couple years before accepting Crawford wouldn\u2019t grant him that opportunity. Crawford publicly acknowledged that fighting the younger, hungry, multidimensional Ennis didn\u2019t make much business sense at this stage of his Hall of Fame career.<\/p>\n

Crawford (41-0, 31 KOs) has instead moved up two weight classes to challenge Alvarez (63-2-2, 39 KOs) for the Mexican legend\u2019s Ring, IBF, WBA, WBC and WBO super middleweight titles. <\/p>\n

The prevailing feeling within the boxing industry is Crawford won\u2019t return to compete at the junior middleweight limit of 154 pounds, even though holding on to his WBA belt at least gives the Omaha, Nebraska, native leverage at that lower weight.<\/p>\n

\u201cProbably not, but I don\u2019t see why not,\u201d Hearn said of Crawford dropping back down in weight. \u201cHe\u2019s not a 68-pounder. He\u2019s not a 60-pounder, either. You know, you saw against Madrimov he might not even be a big 154-pounder. And I think Crawford against Boots is just an unbelievable fight.\u201d<\/p>\n

Crawford, 37, hasn\u2019t fought since he beat Uzbekistan\u2019s Israil Madrimov<\/a> (10-2-1, 7 KOs) by unanimous decision almost 13 months ago at BMO Stadium in Los Angeles. His competitive fight with Madrimov marked Crawford\u2019s only bout above the welterweight limit of 147 pounds.<\/p>\n

Alvarez, 35, has competed at super middleweight or light heavyweight in each of his 12 bouts over the past six years. He still enlisted Ennis as one of his sparring partners recently as he winds down training camp for a fight Netflix will stream worldwide.<\/p>\n

Ennis, meanwhile, is already ranked second by the WBA in the 154-pound division. The former Ring, IBF and WBA welterweight champ announced two months ago that he planned to move up to junior middleweight.<\/p>\n

The top spot in the WBA\u2019s 154-pound rankings should become available because No.1-rated German Abass Baraou<\/a> (17-1, 9 KOs) upset Cuba\u2019s Yoenis Tellez<\/a> (10-1, 7 KOs) by unanimous decision to win the WBA interim title<\/a> on Aug. 23 at Caribe Royale in Orlando, Florida.<\/p>\n

Keith Idec is a senior writer and columnist for The Ring. He can be reached on X @idecboxing.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Eddie Hearn has a lot of respect for Terence Crawford and everything the four-weight world champion has accomplished.The…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":388817,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4108],"tags":[1935,10188,10181,10187,10186,10179,4496,10182,10183,10184,10185,10180,10193,10192,10175,10173,10174,10190,10176,10172,10194,10189,79,10191,10171,10178,16,15,10177],"class_list":{"0":"post-388816","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-boxing","8":"tag-boxing","9":"tag-boxing-community","10":"tag-boxing-fights","11":"tag-boxing-history","12":"tag-boxing-interviews","13":"tag-boxing-magazine","14":"tag-boxing-news","15":"tag-boxing-photos","16":"tag-boxing-rankings","17":"tag-boxing-results","18":"tag-boxing-schedule","19":"tag-boxing-videos","20":"tag-disqualification","21":"tag-draw","22":"tag-fight","23":"tag-fighter","24":"tag-fighter-news","25":"tag-knockout","26":"tag-latest-boxing-matches","27":"tag-ring","28":"tag-ring-magazine","29":"tag-split-decision","30":"tag-sports","31":"tag-technical-knockout","32":"tag-the-ring","33":"tag-top-fighters","34":"tag-uk","35":"tag-united-kingdom","36":"tag-upcoming-boxing-matches"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/115127951268615828","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/388816","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=388816"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/388816\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/388817"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=388816"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=388816"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=388816"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}